From High Culture to Mass Culture in Liverpool 1918-1938
Introduction
This chapter will explore how products and culture became accessible for everyone regardless of class. The rise of mass media changed social norms and how women, especially, should react to the shopping experience. From the conclusions drawn in this chapter, we can see that the working-class consumer enjoyed shopping in the interwar period. Primary sources from the Liverpolitan magazine Lucille of Liverpool show how the media responded to the consumer changes that were taking place in the city at the time. The scholarship Levine details the importance of mass culture in coping with the economic fallout of the Great Depression. Greenwood’s analysis suggests that although there were hardships in northern towns and cities, those women with access to disposable income could afford inexpensive clothing and beauty products. This study details how mass culture was perceived by society and how it affected the women of Liverpool.
Consumer Culture 1918-1938
Despite the economic hardships of the interwar period people still wanted to be entertained. Music, radio, and film proved popular because they were seen inexpensive entertainment.[1] The 1920s was filled with cultural activities, from the cinema to weekly magazines. Audience numbers for those who attended the cinema increased during this time. With the creation of sound appearing in films, ‘Talkies’ became extremely popular and accessible to society who enjoyed the intricate plots that had been missing from silent movies.[2] The increases in culture was also achieved through the use of the radio with the broadcasting of shows bringing a host of programmes to the airwaves in the form of music, news, drama and comedy shows, which were inexpensive to produce for broadcasting companies.[3] It was now possible for society to explore the local, national and global events of the 1930s from their homes with the advances that were made in radio broadcasting.
The interwar era saw the rise of literature and information with the production of books, magazines and literature in large numbers to satisfy demand.[4] The technological improvements that were made in publishing allowed for such publications to be produced quickly and cheaper because of factories ability to mass produce and distribute their products to stores effectively.[5] According to Bell, there were disadvantages to the cultural changes that was previously meant for those who were seen as elite to the mass cultural products that everyone could obtain. The deterioration in intellectual values, according to Bell was a factor because publishers valued their profit margins and entertainment over complex debates.[6] However, the use of mass culture as a tool to entertain the masses in the 1930s was significant in appealing to people who previously did not have access to the cultural market.
The transformations in consumer culture suggest that the interwar years influenced our consumer culture today. Levine implies that there are similarities between ‘folk and mass culture’ that were apparent in the 1930s and that using commercialised ‘mass culture’ helped to ‘produce a sense of community that helped people manage the challenges of the period’.[7] Folk culture offered a sense of belonging in interwar Liverpool with music halls and the cinema being used by people in local communities. Access to this type of mass culture helped unite people facing uncertain times during the Great Depression. For instance, the 1930s by listening to radio programmes and films at the cinema helped bring about a shared experiences for those who witnessed such encounters.
The Rise in Modernity 1920-1938
Between 1922 and 1935, there was a growing need for various domestic items. Most of the products were built not to last. However, they pacified the domestic housewife of the early twentieth century who had grown tired of using appliances that were popular in the Victorian era. An increase in furniture and appliances took place when the demolition of slum housing took place. However, Liverpool’s unemployment rate peaked in 1932, yet surprisingly, sales of products in the same year reached two million pounds. The statistics suggest that these figures were not surpassed until 1940 when the cost of appliances increased. To support the notion that consumer culture was influential during the interwar period the data shows that purchases in the city did not fall below one million and seven hundred pounds between 1920 and 1940.[8] The reduction in household size and the increase of urban living had seen a growing trend from all classes of consumer to purchase similar items. This was aided by the spread of mass culture, the widespread circulation of newspapers, and the increased advertising from businesses which all helped to homogenise social behaviour regardless of class structures. For example, workers at the docks in Liverpool began to dress more like retail assistants, and working-class housewives were now purchasing the same household brands as those from the upper classes.[9] This shows that there was a decline in some areas of class, but it was not a total shift. However, the rise in modern living showed that the working classes hoped to achieve a better standard of living, which could be achieved through modernity.
As discussed in this thesis Liverpool did have elements of poor housing. The Liverpool University Settlement Society in 1931 found ‘defective roofs’ when conducting their survey on the correlation between housing and deprivation. Ill-fitting windows were a problem that could make a home cold and damp, bringing about ill health to its occupants. Some people lived in one room with mattresses doubling as an evening bed and a living quarter during daylight hours. For many living below the poverty line furniture was difficult to come by. What little some people owned was unacceptable for many homes.[10] Taylor claimed in English History, ‘The 1930s have been referred to as the dark years and the devils decade’. To Taylor, living a more affluent lifestyle did not unite with those living in poverty. Although Taylor asserts that most of the population could live more prosperously than ever before.[11] Greenwood argues that historical accounts such as the one from Taylor represent modern interpretations of interwar living. However, to Greenwood, despite the hardships that many faced, consumerism was widespread in northern towns and cities with young ladies wearing ‘cheap artificial stockings, cheap short-skirted frocks, cheap coats, cheap shoes and crimped hair, powder and rouge’.[12] Mass production of garments and beauty items were readily available to those women who had some disposable icon but throughout the historiography cities such as Liverpool are seen as living in complete deprivation when in reality that was not the case for everyone.
Media Attitudes to Consumer Culture 1920-1938
Women from all socioeconomic backgrounds were drawn to various consumer cultures. available to them via several different sources. The interwar period saw print media target women with magazines focusing on women and girls. For working-class women, magazines such as Peg’s Paper were popular and sold alongside magazines such as Women, Woman’s Own and Good Housekeeping. Magazines predominantly aimed at women emphasised beauty standards, fashion trends and the glamour associated with the cinema. More significantly, this kind of magazines taught young women how they should behave towards the opposite sex.[13] Romantic advice became the most sought-after information within these magazines owing to the Hollywood glamour that was written into films and appealed to teenage girls.
The popularity of mass consumerism changed the media’s attitudes towards retailing and the women who occupied these spaces. Although there were sometimes concerns about how consumer culture influenced women, the media used its popularity to portray women as somewhat obsessed with consumerism. The Liverpool monthly magazine Liverpolitan featured a column entitled ‘Lucille of Liverpool’. Penned anonymously, Lucille of Liverpool showed that women could exist within the two spheres of the domestic world and consumer culture. By scrutinising how consumer culture influenced some women in their roles within the home and as consumers, the column helps us understand how women participated in different elements of consumerism. The column depicted a typical shopping experience ‘Receive brochure from George Henry Lees assuring me that this time is the time to shop, as prices were at the lowest and bargains could never be repeated…suggest to David that this is the time to shop who looked unmoved and says he must be going. Am aware of certain unwifey thoughts, and viciously decide to take the wherewithal out of the housekeeping money, which means dealing at Irwin’s shepherd’s pie every Wednesday…but am undeterred’.[14] The media used a somewhat comical portrayal of consumerism that suggested that women would rather shop that care for their husbands. By implying that women were obsessed with consumer culture, it shows that the media were happy to portray women as neglectful and careless when dealing with the family budget, preferring to spend money on shopping for themselves than their husbands who were patiently waiting at home for a cooked meal.
Media narratives like the one used in Lucille’s diary imply that the shopping experience gripped women. ‘A Liverpool Lady’s Wardrobe’, a 2006 exhibition at the Liverpool Walker Art Gallery, detailed one woman’s life consumed by retailing in the interwar period. Unworn clothing owned by Emily Tinne who lived in Liverpool was exhibited by her estate. The exhibition could only display some items, and the number of garments donated shows how influential consumer culture was to Mrs Tinne.[15] Emily Tinne had wealth and was lavish in her spending on furs and hats, with many remaining unworn from the department stores they were bought from such as Bon Marche and Owen Owen. However, despite Emily’s wealth her interest in shopping may not have been uncommon with many women using consumer culture as a hobby.[16] With the rise of the shopping experience especially attracting women to their stores, women were seen as able to shape consumer culture. Lucille of Liverpool and the exhibition of Emily Tinne give a sense of women on opposite ends of the financial spectrum being obsessed with consumerism in Liverpool.
Conclusion
The transformations to consumerism brought high culture to the general public. Through visits to the cinema, women were able to copy the styles of their favourite film stars, with trends being copied through mass media channels such as magazines. Books became cheap to produce, allowing the spread of ideas to take place, creating a sense of unity and shared encounters. Despite the high levels of poverty that were still apparent in Liverpool, there were indications through the rise of mass marketing that the class system was narrowing. Historians such as Taylor depicted Liverpool as a city that was in decline. However, because of the mass marketing of products being produced much cheaper than ever, consumers could still use the fashion trends that were available to them. Through ideas presented to women through magazine articles, women could access ideas on contemporary fashion and how to dress appropriately. There is evidence, from feature articles such as Lucille of Liverpool that the media capitalised on women’s enjoyment of shopping to suggest that they were obsessed with consumerism. Through the media, there was the realisation that the female consumer experience had shown that Liverpool could improve their economy and bring about stability during an era blighted by poverty and deprivation.
Conclusion
This thesis has examined if the rise of the working-class female shopper in Liverpool led to a culture of abundance. By combining the individual topics of this dissertation, this conclusion summarises the research discovered within the four chapters and suggests some approaches for additional investigation.
Summary
When the four chapters are investigated simultaneously, it is clear that the rise of the working-class woman shopper in interwar Liverpool did lead to a culture of abundance. At the same time, poverty and deprivation were still engrained within the population of Liverpool throughout the interwar period, with one of the reasons being the decline of dockyard activity. The 0.2 per cent annual reduction in trade at the dock shows that Liverpool was affected by the changes to trade routes, further slowing down the economy. With such deterioration of dockyard trade, the demands for raw materials fell, bringing about a decline in the manufacturing of materials that were being produced across Liverpool. The shrinkage of labour at the port of Liverpool led to high levels of unemployment and placed the city in financial decline; this, coupled with the Great Depression, saw the dock’s reliance on industries also struggling in the economic downturn. Liverpool docks struggled because of their financial difficulties, and the city faced challenges after World War I. Once soldiers returned home, they faced challenges because of injuries received during the war and their inability to find employment because of these needs. In order to support their families, some women had little choice but to enter the workplace while their husbands were recuperating at home from their war injuries. The increase in employment within the retail sector helped some women achieve this. For men who could work, though, finding full-time employment at the docks was difficult. Employment for some came in the form of a three-day working work or casualisation, with those who struggled to find employment relying on a system that saw unemployed men turning up at the docks to see if potential employers would choose them for work. This system left many feeling humiliated and degraded. However, for those who could find work, life was not much better with casualisation, low pay and the threat of unemployment, bringing a lack of security to their lives and their families. The difficulties faced by families impacted upon women who usually ran their homes within the domestic sphere so dealt with the household expenditure.
Women who fell into extreme hardship faced challenges, and some looked to local moneylenders to help their families falling further into debt. Usually, women borrowed money without the knowledge of their husbands because of the shame that was associated with moneylending practices that took place. Seeking out a moneylender was a last resort for borrowing because it came with predatory payback systems, such as high-interest rates. In order to stop this kind of borrowing, the government brought in the Moneylending Act of 1927 to stop illegal moneylending practices and educate those who wanted to borrow money about the pitfalls of such community lending. Although the act was a failure, moneylending practices did decrease in Liverpool. There may be two reasons for that, one being the financial difficulties that people were experiencing in the 1930s. The other is that some women were able to leave the domestic sphere and gain employment in places such as retail, allowing them some disposable income that could be spent on consumerism.
The developments in manufacturing brought about by the Industrial Revolution helped to enhance commercialisation and make products accessible to a wider range of people. The improvements in mass production allowed working-class women to enter spaces such as the department store that had previously been reserved for middle- and upper-class females. However, the technological advances in manufacturing and the change in attitudes from the working class towards consumerism gave department stores the chance to profiteer from these changes by increasing the number of products they sold within their stores to cope with the demand. For some women who could enter the workplace, their empowerment helped to create an increase in demand for extravagant goods, with the department store having the monopoly on such products because they could offer a wide selection of consumer products to suit all budgets under one roof. However, such positive changes to retailing saw a decline in dressmakers. With the increase in manufacturing came garments being produced for a cheaper price. Consumers found purchasing cheaper clothing was more economical than seeking a professional seamstress for repair. By offering such a selection of goods, department stores were able to eliminate the competition from smaller independent retailers in urban areas. The improvements to transportation links saw customers accessing stores more easily, with those who lived in urban communities able to travel to the city centre, which had now become the commercial centre for shopping.
What also helped to increase the appeal of the department store was the introduction of Hollywood glamour in the 1930s. The cinema inspired women to replicate the looks of the actresses they saw in the movies, with department stores capitalising on shoppers’ enthusiasm by offering promotions to bring the consumer to their stores. The department store brought the glamour of Hollywood to their business, and it allowed women especially to enter the world of fantasy, helping them to imagine a more exciting lifestyle where they did not have to be concerned with domesticity. However, there was the negative side of department stores being able to mass-produce their goods. The reduction in quality was a factor because the manufacturing process put quantity over quality. This brought about an increase in garments being discarded and replaced.
Advances in marketing campaigns saw department stores use Civic Week to entice customers to their stores. Using mannequin parades and unique selling points, such as inviting famous stars to their stores, allowed shoppers to experience the department store as a site of leisure and entertainment. Managers used a whole host of marketing techniques to attract customers to visit their department stores, including the use of window displays, which became an important selling point that the passing trade could enjoy. However, the department store being seen as a place of elegance and lavish spending had a detrimental effect on street sellers who, according to Liverpool council, did not positively affect the city centre as a place where consumers could enjoy retailing.
Advertisements from department stores in newspapers such as the Liverpool Echo were read mainly by the working-class population of Liverpool. This helped to increase sales for department stores by using mass media to highlight their products. Mass production and marketing increases intended mainly for female shoppers encouraged potential customers to visit stores to copy the styles printed in the Liverpool Echo. Using garments that were once considered extravagant allowed department stores to manufacture fur products by using cheaper fur to appeal to working-class females. Using this approach allowed stores to customise their clothing to the consumer’s specific needs and bring clothing that was considered luxurious to the masses. Stores managed to maintain control of the consumer market, and eventually, there was less need for such advertisements because trust in consumerism was high within the department store. The increases in marketing and advertising allowed working-class women to use the department store not only as a place for consumerism but as a site of leisure, socialisation and entertainment and through this mass appeal of the department store, working-class women discovered that they were able to participate in the consumer culture that they were once excluded.
By becoming sites of leisure and entertainment, department stores were able to revolutionise the shopping experience for their customers, and by capitalising on the societal changes of the time, such as the rise in Hollywood glamour and their ability to bring inexpensive products to consumers, they were able to survive the Great Depression era. For most of the country, department stores were in decline, but in Liverpool, due to the business sense of store owners, they managed to succeed independently. Frederick Marquis, chairman of Lewis’s Department store, understood that Liverpool was rooted in deep poverty, which brought shame upon families. Marquis believed Lewis could help people achieve a better standard of living. By employing men and women who had a university standard of education, the store established a staff training division to educate staff members on retail practices, which could lead to promotions within the store. Lewis’s was forward-thinking regarding supporting their staff by offering them meals, providing health care, and giving them two weeks’ yearly holiday with pay. These modifications created good relations between the workers and the management and encouraged staff to remain employed at the store rather than looking for employment elsewhere.
The growth of mass media during the interwar period led to an increase in people accessing culture like never before with the technological advances in radio broadcasting. Their ability to use mass culture was significant to the working-class population, who had previously been excluded from cultural innovations. For residents in Liverpool, the growth of mass culture offered a common bond with others who were accessing the same music and literature, with music halls and cinemas helping to bring people together through shared experiences. By bringing people together, it helped to bridge some gaps that existed in class structures. However, this was not a total change; the growth of mass culture allowed the working classes to aspire to a better standard of living. As shown in this study, the mass production of clothing and products was more accessible to people who had disposable income. Although, within the historiography, Liverpool was seen as a city that lived in complete poverty and deprivation. This study has attempted to reveal that this was not the case for everyone.
Within the change from high culture to mass culture, working-class women could access magazines more easily, with most seeking out the latest fashion trends, beauty styles and romantic advice because the glamourous lifestyles of film stars interested young teenage girls. Although, despite the media’s attempts to sway women into the world of consumerism, there was also the narrative from newspapers and magazines that suggested that women were becoming obsessed with consumer culture. By implying that women were negligent in their household duties of the domestic sphere and would instead shop contrasts against the advertisements from department stores that local newspapers allowed in their publications. However, this thesis shows that with the changes made to retailing, such as the mass production of clothing, department store managers attract working-class women into their stores through mass advertising and marketing strategies. The change from a high culture previously available to the middle and upper classes and the rise of the working-class woman shopper in interwar Liverpool led to a culture of abundance.
Approaches for Further Analysis
This dissertation has considered whether the rise of the working-class woman shopper in interwar Liverpool led to a culture of abundance, although this area of study is a small part of history amongst a wider narrative of the economic situation in Liverpool. As a result, the research can be taken further. Although Charlotte Wildman offers analysis into the urban redevelopments in Liverpool during this era, further research can be developed in the ways in which people shopped when the slum clearance in Liverpool began and families moved away from the city centre. More data can be collected by locating people through census records who worked or shopped in Liverpool’s department stores and although these people will now be deceased they may have family members who could impart stories or items of interest from an era of history that has still to be discovered.
This study has attempted to explain the growth of consumerism in the interwar period through an analytical lens. It offers a historical analysis into the working-class woman shopper with the opportunity for further research into how far such women were using the department store rather than independent shops and chain stores to purchase their goods. Finally, although this topic of this thesis has offered evidence to show that the rise of the working-class woman shopper in interwar Liverpool led to a culture of abundance, additional research is required to focus on the daily routines of these women and how far they were able to break free from their household duties, the domestic sphere and if they could financially support themselves through the employment opportunities that were available to them.
[1] Edward Shils, ‘Mass Society and Its Culture’, Daedalus, 2 (1960), pp. 292-309.
[2] Kraft, James P. Kraft, ‘Musicians in Hollywood: Work and Technological Change in Entertainment Industries, 1926-1940’, Technology and Culture 2 (1994), pp. 293-296
[3] Alice Goldfarb Marquis, ‘Written on the Wind: The Impact of Radio during the 1930s’, Journal of Contemporary History, 3 (1984), pp. 386-412.
[4] Berry Mayall, and Virginia Morrow, In You Can Help Your Country: English Children’s Work during the Second World War, (London, 2011), p. 26-42.
[5] Bonnie White, ‘‘What to Do with the Girls?’ The Legacy of Women Farm Workers in Britain, 1919—1939’, Historical Reflections, 2 (2016), pp. 97-101.
[6] Daniel Bell, ‘The Cultural Contradictions of Capitalism’, Journal of Aesthetic Education, 6 (1972), pp. 23-34.
[7] Lawrence W. Levine, ‘The Folklore and its Audiences’, American Historical Review, 97 (1992), pp. 1369-99.
[8] Briggs, Friends of the People the Centenary History of Lewis’s, p. 181
Frederick Marquis, Chairman of Lewis’s Department Store.
Chapter Three
Behind the Scenes of Retailing 1918-1936
Introduction
This chapter will examine consumerism from a business point of view and how economic growth in retailing helped to empower the workforce of Lewis’s department store. Discussion is brought forth from the biography of Frederick Marquis, the chairman of Lewis’s, who was also skilled in economics. Marquis details the transformations in the mass production of consumer goods and how his business improved the employment sector at the store. Gaps within the scholarship can be found here with the lack of primary sources from other businessmen debating the rise of consumerism in Liverpool. However, discussions from scholars such as Jefferies and De Grazia criticise the decline of department stores during the interwar period. Although Marquis argues that consumerism from department stores increased during the interwar period in Liverpool because the city reinvented itself as a place of consumerism. Chapter Two helped explain how the mass production of clothing transformed consumerism in Liverpool. This chapter goes a step further by explaining how businesses achieved these manufacturing changes, which made clothing affordable for working-class customers. Discussion will also be given on the creation of a welfare department by Lewis’s who introduced a two-week holiday and healthcare to their workforce. In detailing these transformations in consumerism, the biography of Marquis is a valuable primary source for this thesis.
Frederick Marquis – Chairman of Lewis’s and his Redesigning of the Department Store 1918-1936
The end of the 1930s saw Liverpool’s city centre fully invested in the retail trade. With the help of Frederick Marquis, Lewis’s was transformed in all retail areas, Marquis used his ability as an economist to improve productivity and profit margins, which allowed the store to trickle this success down to the workforce through pay and welfare reforms. Marquis claimed in his biography that ‘capital risk-taking and productivity in management were creating better employment conditions and improving the general public’s standard of living’.[1] However, this was not always the case because, during the Victorian era department store shopping was a limited experience for the middle and upper classes to enjoy.[2] Coz and Hobley support the claim by Nava suggesting that other than as workers working-class women were excluded from retailing encounters within city centres.[3] Jeffreys though, argues that after World War I, shopping habits changed with consumer behaviour favouring chain stores and cooperatives rather than department stores.[4] With De Grazia claiming that during the interwar period department store retailers in Britain struggled to adapt to the needs of their customers and the increase of the chain store.[5] From this analysis the general understanding in the scholarship is that after World War I consumerism surrounding department stores was fading from the once luxurious sites of shopping they once were.
Nevertheless, Liverpool was the exception and store managers like Marquis were able to redevelop their shops into populist retail centres that offered economic stability from the financial instability of the Great Depression.[6] Store managers in Liverpool understood that by creating an enticing consumer experience by taking advantage of the layout of their stores, such as the architecture and interior design they could attract customers into their stores. With stores restaurants and cafes bringing more customers in to department stores managers were able to encourage customers to devote more of their time and spend more of their disposable income at their businesses.[7] In Liverpool the importance of bringing about such an inviting consumer experience helped to safeguard department stores from the devastation of the economic downturn that the 1930s brought with consumers taking advantage of the leisure and entertainment facilities that stores were able to provide. These strategies helped department stores thrive despite the economic crash of the 1930s and helped Liverpool’s consumer economy flourish.
Marquis was able to use his economic acumen to bring a level of stability to Lewis’s department store during such uncertain times. For the people living during the Great Depression in Liverpool, there was a need for a reduction in the cost of living and a greater necessity for an increase in job stability. According to Marquis Lewis’s, was able to achieve within these areas despite the financial uncertainties of the time.[8] However, as discussed in previous chapters, department stores were able to lower the price of their consumer goods through advances in manufacturing, but for many families, the price of essential items such as food created a drain on family expenses. Although consumer culture did increase for the working-class shopper, there were still high levels of poverty within Liverpool, so the changes that department stores made only impacted those who had access to disposable income. The adjustments that department stores made also brought competition to smaller retailers leading to the closure of many businesses across the city as they struggled to compete. With this in mind, department stores were able to monopolise economic control, which negatively impacted on the variety of shops within urban areas.
Marquis and his Thoughts on Poverty in Liverpool 1926-1938
Marquis detailed the poverty he experienced in Liverpool in his memoir and discussed the alarming unemployment rates in 1926. To Marquis, those who experienced high levels of deprivation between 1908 and 1910 still made up a considerable amount of those suffering in the late 1920s. For those who had experienced poverty at such high levels at the turn of the century, they had memories of the psychological and physical damage to their health that the hopelessness of those times caused. Marquis realised that during the deprivation he witnessed in Liverpool during the later years of the 1920s, something had to change to help the city’s economy. To support the lack of employment at the docks discussed in chapter one, Marquis details the lack of cargo at the port and with no ships sailing into the docks, Liverpool had to use other ways to increase their productivity in the city.[9] Marquis understood that the people living with such high levels of unemployment would rather work than rely on benefits, which brought a sense of shame to so many families within the city.
The aim for Marquis was to market Liverpool as a place for industry and business first. Trade leaders, including Marquis, created the Liverpool Organisation for Advancing the Trade and Commerce of Liverpool. The objective of establishing such an organisation, was to improve Liverpool’s association with industry and manufacturing. Liverpool Corporation invested in the project and offered £10,000 annually to market it. As discussed in chapter two, Liverpool benefitted from Civic Week celebrations, and this was made possible because of the trade association establishing the event. Civic Week brought many people to the city and was seen as a business triumph for Marquis. For those who could spend money, they did; however, not only did the city benefit economically, but the event also gave a sense of civic pride to the residents of Liverpool. Promoting the city in this way, those who attended the event wrote to family and friends in other areas of the country to spread the word about Liverpool as a centre for consumerism.[10] Civic Week, in this respect, brought free advertising for Liverpool with the spread of word of mouth from those who attended the festivities. Liverpool was now seen as a consumer hub and had come to represent the city’s economic wealth.
Mass Production from a Business Perspective 1924-1925
During the interwar period, technological advances in mass production helped create more affordable clothing lines. Because clothing could now be produced more economically and effectively, garments became more available to a wide range of potential customers.[11] According to Marquis, the aim of the improvements to the mass production of garments was to successfully change Liverpool into a place of consumerism by offering clothing from The United States of America to sell on to the customers of Lewis’s for one guinea. With this success manufacturers in Britain were confident that they could rival America in the quality of their designs. Marquis affirms that from the start of the mass production of clothing, Lewis’s acquired the copyright of specific designs. The cheaper resources in place to mass-produce garments helped make clothing more affordable for the working class. According to Marquis, such improvements in manufacturing allowed those employed to purchase such items.[12] The alterations in societal norms and attitudes towards fashion trends were also instrumental in the affordability of products. By 1924 factories could still use up their stock of Khaki coloured material that had been set aside for World War I. Skirts had become shorter in length and more comfortable owing to the lighter fabric that could be used.[13] The period between the war saw a change in fashion trends of a more causal and sensible approach to clothing, as opposed to the more lavish and costly trends before the advances in mass production had taken place. Simple and inexpensive clothing options were influential in enticing the working-class consumer to department stores.
Radical Changes in Lewis’s Department Store for Employees 1920-1928
The improvements made to Lewis’s department store were established by businessmen who understood the consumer needs. According to Marquis, the economic downturn of the 1930s saw the rise of the Labour Party, which arose with the need for greater pay and better working conditions. Marquis believed that Lewis’s as a company could facilitate these changes by offering their workforce a better standard of living.[14] The store hired men and women who had acquired a university education to set up a staff training division. By employing educated people, the store managers felt that training the educated staff in retail practices could enhance the shop worker’s ability and offer them promotions in the future. When it came to retailing, Lewis’s was always ahead of its competitors, and in 1921, it created a welfare section to deal with any concerns that arose within its workforce. A pamphlet aimed at the staff read that ‘female staff are provided with meals in the building and are entitled to forty-five minutes for dinner and twenty minutes for tea.[15] This was an innovative invention for the time because retail stores were not known for providing benefits to their workforce.
Lewis’s department store was different from their competitors and offered health examinations to their female staff. If unwell, an employee would need to undertake a further examination upon their return. Sports and leisure facilities were expanded upon by promoting clubs and social groups. To go alongside all these changes, the Shop Assistants Union supported the changes that Lewis’s had brought about with a new earnings structure.[16] Lewis’s also protected their staff with the structure of proper working hours, paid holidays for two weeks a year was assured, health, dental and optical provisions were provided, and support for those who were interested in maintaining a pension with the store was given. The workers’ council that was created was seen as the most suitable forum to discuss any disputes within the workforce that arose. Store managers guaranteed the confidentiality of the workforce through the medium of the workers’ council. A joint council of store management and Lewis’s workforce also met often to put forward ideas and to resolve any concerns that arose within the store.[17] Such changes helped to establish good employer-employee relations and helped to establish Lewis’s as a business that looked after their workforce.
Conclusion With the support of Frederick Marquis and businessmen like him, they created a better standard of living through employment opportunities and ensured that their workforce was looked after. Academics such as Jeffreys discussed in his book Retail Trading in Britain 1850-1950 that department stores were less popular than they once were with the rise of the chain store dominating consumer culture. However, Liverpool became the exception, with department stores increasing in popularity through Marquis’ redesign of the department store into a site of leisure and entertainment. Civic Week also helped boost the department store’s appeal, with customers flocking to Liverpool to experience the festivities on offer. One of Marquis’ ambitions was to ensure that products were inexpensive for working-class consumers. Through improvements that were made to manufacturing, Lewis’s was able to supply clothing to its customers for a fraction of the cost. Lewis’s also invested in its workforce and was able to create a welfare department to take care of its staff with proper break times. Female employees were offered health care assessments, an annual two-week holiday was given to all staff, and a modern pay structure that benefited many employees, especially those with children to care for. Such transformations for the consumer and employees paved the way for the contemporary shopping encounters we see today.
[1] Marquis, The Memoirs of the Rt Hon. The Earl of Woolton, p. 93.
[2] Nava, ‘Modernity’s Disavowal: Women, the city and the Department Store’, p. 38-76.
[3] Pamela Coz and Annabel Hobley, Shopgirls: The True Story of Life Behind the Counter, (London, 2015), p. 50
[4] James B. Jeffreys, Retail Trading in Britain 1850-1950, (Cambridge, 1954), p. 335.
[5] Victoria De Grazia, Irresistible Empire America’s Advance through 20th Century Europe, (Cambridge, 2005), p. 70.
[6] Marquis, The Memoirs of the Rt Hon. The Earl of Woolton, p. 94.
[7] Sharon Zukin, ‘Urban Lifestyles: Diversity and Standardisation in Spaces of Consumption’, Urban Studies 35, no. 5-6, (1998), pp. 829-832.
[8] Marquis, The Memoirs of the Rt Hon. The Earl of Woolton, p. 87.
[11] Sharon Zukin, and Jennifer Smith Maguire, ‘Consumers and Consumption’, Annual Review of Sociology 30 no. 1 (2004), p. 177.
[12] Marquis, The Memoirs of the Rt Hon. The Earl of Woolton, p. 112.
[13] Elizabeth Gittus, ‘A Study of the Unemployed of Merseyside’, in Merseyside Social and Economic Studies, ed Richard Lawton and Catherine M. Cunningham, (London, 1970), p. 125.
[14] Briggs, Friends of the People the Centenary History of Lewis’s, p. 7-10.
This chapter explains the rise of the shopping experience in Liverpool from 1920 to 1939. The conclusion drawn from this chapter will help to better understand the changes made to the retail sector in Liverpool and how such activity brought about a period of regeneration. The scholarship used for this chapter varied, with Charlotte Wildman’s book Urban Redevelopment and Modernity in Liverpool and Manchester 1918-1939 offering analysis into the changes that Liverpool as a city made in achieving the improvements made in retailing. Despite this, there are gaps in the academic literature in areas such as using Liverpool’s manufacturing to explain the rise in mass production that benefitted consumerism in the city. The debates put forward by Todd examine how more women joined the workforce and acquired economic autonomy to spend their money on items that were once considered luxuries. However, with this increase in consumer spending, Ayers provides statistics to support the argument that consumerism impacted the home dressmaker’s decline.
Scholarly debate from Richards show that the rise of Hollywood glamour experienced in cinemas was influential in shoppers’ consumer purchases in the interwar era. Primary sources from newspapers help to support the argument that retail executives were using clever marketing techniques to draw customers to their stores. With department stores used as leisure sites by showcasing new fashions through parades, a view supported by Todd, and shows that stores were not just used as shopping areas but as places of leisure where potential customers did not necessarily have to make a purchase. However, although the rise of consumerism appears glamorous on the surface Gittus and Houlbrook argued that women felt that they had no choice but to keep up with consumer culture. Although the rise of the shopping experience can be seen as a positive step that boosted the economy and employment, according to Benjamin it impacted negatively on street traders with Liverpool Council wanting to portray the city centre positively and remove those traders who made the city centre look run down. The discussions put forward in this chapter examine the positives and negatives associated with the rise of the shopping experience in interwar Liverpool and how such changes impacted the consumer.
Improvements to the retail trade post World War I
In the interwar period, Liverpool found alternative ways to bring stability to the city. One way of achieving this was through consumerism. Scott and Walker state that consumerism achieved on a large scale benefitted society as a whole, regardless of class.[1] Through mass production, the luxuries that only the middle and upper classes could afford would become accessible to every shopper, including the working classes. The financial havoc of World War I is a primary reason why there was a transformation in retail marketing. However, the benefits of the technological advancements that were made in manufacturing products saw factories increase their production like never before. The reason for such improvements can be found in the Industrial Revolution which helped to enhance the manufacturing process through improvements in areas such as machinery, allowing garments to be made quicker. This cost-cutting exercise lowered the costs for retail stores, which could then be passed down to the consumer, making garments inexpensive and available to a broad consumer base. As a result of the higher standards in production retailers were able to focus their marketing strategies on the working-class shopper by providing cheaper items in larger quantities.[2] With the increase in production methods it was a golden opportunity for department stores to capitalise on the societal changes that were taking place in Liverpool after World War I.
Societal and Cultural Changes within the Shopping Experience 1920-1939
Transformations in consumer attitudes took place after World War I, with the working class seeking to replicate the lifestyles of the wealthy. The use of advertising and the media was also a factor in promoting the theory that purchasing luxury items was indicative of wealth and status.[3] The outcome of this change in attitudes towards retailing amongst the working class allowed department stores to offer an increase in products that would provide for the increase in demand. The empowerment of women and the increase of some equal opportunities within society were also important in the increased demand for luxury products.
Within Todd’s research, it is evident that some women were able to gain financial independence by entering the workforce. By finding employment, they could then afford goods that were deemed only for the wealthy.[4] Gurney agrees with Todd’s analysis and suggests that the changes in societal norms and the aspirations of some women impacted the rise of the purchasing of luxury goods regardless of class.[5] Department stores played an important role here as they were able to offer a variety of products under one roof. The appeal of stores capable of offering a range of goods enticed shoppers from all socioeconomic backgrounds. The diversity of the products available to the consumer characterised modernity within the consumer experience and led to the current retail practices that we see today.
Advances in Manufacturing and the Decline of the Home Dressmaker 1914-1938
The transformations in manufacturing could only be achieved through private business investment. Those businesses with the funds to finance their manufacturing businesses were able to bring new developments in equipment and train their workforce to use new machinery. Also, with transportation links in place, increases in productivity could be achieved. A sound transport system meant that the hauling of raw materials and finished products would ensure that products were successfully transferred to stores.[6] Cheaper clothing was now available in substantial quantities because factories were able to produce a large number of standardised garments, and this made clothing inexpensive to the working-class customer. According to Briggs, if tailoring was only available in smaller specialised outlets or a home dressmaker, then the amount of clothing could never have become available to the masses.[7] The increase of factory-made clothing changed the standard of clothing that was available to the working class and brought about a rise in accessible garments.
The number of dressmakers registered in Liverpool changed dramatically during the interwar period. According to statistics, 149 dressmakers worked in outer Liverpool in 1922; this number had decreased to 38 by 1938. Within the city centre, there was also a fall in dressmakers from 158 to 106 between the same period.[8] The data shows that the economic recession of the 1930s may have brought about a decrease in custom for dressmaking with a decline in how many people could afford a professional seamstress. The mass production of garments did not help the industry as products were now available at a cheaper price, and it was cheaper to pay for mass-produced fashions rather than repair an item of clothing. In this respect, the demise of the skilled dressmaker can be discovered in the growth of modern shopping experiences in the interwar period.
The Decline of the Smaller Retailer Outside of the City Centre 1922-1938
The number of retailers that sold hosiers and gloves in Liverpool city centre remained stable at twenty-one in 1922 and twenty in 1938. This shows that Liverpool city centre became a hub for commercialisation with the success of the hosier and glove industries benefitting from an increase in trade. Between 1922 and 1938 there was a change in the number of clothes shops in Liverpool. The city centre occupied thirty-five per cent of the share of shops, but by 1938 the number of shops was sixty per cent. The statistics are very different for the urban areas of Liverpool with the number of shops falling from sixty-four per cent to forty per cent. Similar data can be found when looking at clothing shops. For those registered in urban areas there were 1,109 shops in 1922 and 2,025 shops within the boundaries of the city centre. Within Wildman’s data there was a decline in clothing stores in Liverpool as a whole and by 1938, 830 shops were registered in urban areas with 1209 listed within the city centre. These statistics show that by the end of the interwar period clothing shops were more prevalent in Liverpool’s city centre.[9] Analysing the data we can see that the fall in shops within the city centre shows that with department stores operating a one-stop shopping experience for the consumer they were able to eliminate the competition from smaller independent shops. The city of Liverpool was now at the centre of consumerism brought about by the advances in the manufacturing industry. The clothing industry attracted customers to department stores, which helped to bring further growth prospects.
Lewis’s Department Store in Liverpool city centre expanded in size during the 1920s and 1930s. Because of passing trade, it made more sense from a business point of view to have the department stores in the commercial district of the city centre. The complex financial circumstances that the Great Depression brought meant that enticing potential customers to businesses was essential. In order to do this, Liverpool Corporation invested in the city centre by improving transportation links so customers could travel into the city’s commercial heart.[10] The department store was crucial for the success of the city centre, with stores such as Owen Owen and Lewis’s expanding in size in terms of the consumer products that were available to customers. The improvements to transport links allowed customers from the urban areas to access these stores, which helped to reinforce the city centre as a commercial hub.
The Recreation of Hollywood Glamour through Retailing 1930-1940
The demand for inexpensive, well-fitted clothing increased because the working class increased in numbers and purchasing power. Small tailoring businesses or home dressmakers would not have been able to maintain the demand size. Another cause was the expense involved. Specialised shops and home dressmakers usually charged higher prices for their services owing to the time and effort required for custom dressmaking. Mass production lowered costs and made clothing more reasonably priced for the working class.[11] Mass-produced clothing required less time and effort to create than individually designed garments. Workers could concentrate on other responsibilities instead of spending hours creating or altering their clothing.
According to Schweitzer, when it came to mass-produced clothing, the early twentieth century saw people wanting clothing styles that were inspired by the fashion trends seen in Hollywood at the time.[12] Hollywood actresses such as Katherine Hepburn, Joan Crawford, and Ginger Rogers were respected for their class, style, and impeccable elegance. Their desirable looks on screen, categorised by lustrous hairstyles, modern clothing, and flawless makeup, became what women wanted to achieve in this era. The working classes were also motivated by these Hollywood images, as they sought to recreate the glamourous looks of these on-screen stars. However, according to Meaney and O’Dowd et al., women from all walks of life acquired ways to mimic the designs promoted by Hollywood. They often adjusted their garments and makeup choices to suit their individual circumstances and resources. Retailers were influenced by glamourous actresses and used this marketing ploy to bring consumers to their stores. This allowed managers to market their shops as places of style. Richard’s analyse indicates, that in the mid-1930s just over 900 million people were actively attending the cinema and these figures continued to increase to over a million by 1940.[13] The Hollywood glamour of the 1930s extended beyond the silver screen. It directly influenced consumer culture in Liverpool, with department stores notably reflecting this trend.
Within the interwar era retailers were able to use shoppers interest in film culture to attract more customers to their stores. Bon Marche department store, located on Church Street in Liverpool city centre was one retailer that liked to use the appeal of the cinema to attract customers. Harry Gordon Selfridge, an American businessman and retail pioneer owned George Henry Lee’s and Bon Marche, which were regarded as opulent department stores. Selfridge helped to create a consumer ideology in 1920s Britain.[14] Frederick Marquis, chairman of Lewis’s, criticised Selfridge for his arrogance and egotism, but they shared a commitment to revitalising consumer culture and improving shopping habits.[15] In Bon Marche customers could buy a ‘Just like Marlene’s’ with fans of the actress Marlene Dietrich being able to purchase a high-street coat that was a replica of the coat that the famous actress wore in her latest film.[16] Events for consumers to attend at department stores was also a clever marketing technique.
For instance, an advertisement in the Liverpool Echo in 1938 invited customers to Bon Marche to view a mannequin parade. Titled ‘A Symphony of Fashion’ were ‘the lovely clothes, the clever grouping, and the graceful movement of the girls, combines to make this a really beautiful performance’.[17] Todd asserts that the parades at department stores became valuable because they allowed women the chance to attend an event without making a purchase. Such occasions helped influence the connection between shopping, culture, and leisure.[18] Popular culture offered females original, fashionable, and aspiring imaginings, which played on make-believe, allowing women to envisage a life without domestic labour and lingering poverty.
Leach suggests that the city became the centre for style, consumerism, and social mobility, letting women express themselves and break away from their customary roles and expectations.[19] Britain followed America in creating beauty. The cinematic heroines were role models for all women. Millions of women were subjected to the vision of femininity, which aided capitalism. In addition to the economic gains made in the film and cosmetics industries, glamour became obtainable on the market. Gittus argues that this covered for the economic anguish that lay beneath the millions of pounds spent as well as the exhaustion and discontent that persisted in the real world outside of the cinemas.[20]Although the increases in inexpensive fashions, allowed working-class women to keep up with the modern styles. They could invest in outfits and accessories that exposed the time’s changing social and cultural customs.
The newfound capability to express themselves through fashion gave women a sense of liberation and assurance. Furthermore, the shopping experience itself was frequently a thrilling social experience. Women would gather with friends or family members to browse, try on clothing, and trade opinions. The department stores were a space where women could socialise, form networks, and foster connections beyond their immediate neighbourhood. This social aspect of shopping further contributed to the transformation of their identities. Houlbrook suggests that interwar Britain signified a distinct change like selfhood, and ‘rather than authentic, stable, and immediately discernible, identity was increasingly presented as something fashioned through a careful engagement with consumer culture’.[21] Lemire argues that mass-produced clothing allowed people to access those designs without the hefty price tag associated with custom tailoring.[22] However, both the accessibility of mass-produced clothing had positive and negative consequences on the universal specification of the quality of garments. Berry states that the democratisation of fashion allowed people to express themselves through their individual style.[23] But the increase in manufactured clothing resulted in a decrease in the overall quality of garments. With the emphasis of quantity, manufacturers focused on reducing production expenses, often compromising the quality materials and craftmanship. This led to the invention of throwaway, poorly assembled garments that would wear out quickly.
The Entertaining Department Stores 1925-1932
Despite the economic insecurities retailers helped to create a shared identity that cut across class boundaries. Nava debates that in the past women shopping within extravagant department stores was limited to the middle classes, but in the 1930s women were able to encounter modernity like never before.[24] This was achieved through Liverpool Corporation in 1925, holding a yearly Civic Week event with department stores such as Lewis’s promoting mannequin parades and store events for their expanding consumer base.[25] By celebrating civic week stores used sponsored parades and performances to entice people to their businesses to purchase goods.
A report in the Liverpool Mercury details the unique selling point organised by the Bon Marche department store, which invited the actress Gracie Fields to their store to work as a shop assistant for the afternoon in August 1932. Because of her popularity, Gracie’s appearance had many women wanting to see the actress in store. Although some women may not have been able to afford to make a purchase upon Gracie’s visit, they still wanted to visit the store and see Gracie for themselves because she symbolised the cinematic femineity of the 1930s. Fashion trends were heightened during the interwar period for all adults and teenagers alike; from this need to remain fashionable came the greater need from the consumer for a range of clothing that kept up with the trends. In Lewis’s women’s department, there was a greater emphasis placed on selling dresses and coats that would suit every occasion rather than clothing, which was seen as sensible and practical. The Central Buying Office at Lewis’s kept abreast of the fashion changes by scrutinising the fashion houses in Paris. In an advertising pamphlet for Lewis’s in 1925 the store advertised their new lines as ‘a spring array of new frocks from Paris fashion houses. In Lewis’s, you will find gowns from Paris and other continental centres, woollens from Bradford, silks from Lyon and Macclesfield – merchandise from wherever it may be bought to supply the fashions of the day for the women of taste and moderate means’.[26] There was the need for department stores to keep up with the fashions that were promoted through cinema.
The magazine Liverpolitan, was instrumental in showing how Liverpool created a contemporary shopping culture in the city. By demonstrating the change of fortune in the Bold Street area of Liverpool, the magazine depicted a vivid analysis of the transformations occurring across the city’s consumer landscape. The article titled The Renaissance of Bold Street offered a detailed look at the street ‘some of the shops, with their novel and artistic frontages, invite you irresistibly to look first and then almost magnetise you to go on. Inside, they are like elegant parlours with an intimate air that makes the purchasing of articles more a matter of friendliness than a blunt commercial transaction’.[27] The depiction by the Liverpolitan magazine gives a welcoming environment to the consumer that heightened the retail experience for the shopper.
Another way store managers attracted customers to their department stores was through striking window displays, with department store windows in the 1920s being used to marketing the products that could be found in stores. Utilising shop windows as a way of selling began in Paris and New York. It resulted in windows being packed with consumer products.[28] Innovations in marketing and visual selling in the 1920s helped to create artistic displays with window dressers making exciting displays that would include the most sought-after products by using topics, colour and theatrical props to attract the customer to their stores. By ensuring that there was an eye-catching display enabled department stores to stand out from shops who did not take part in window dressing. With many stores competing for customer interest, the unique displays brought individuality and the ability to appeal to the consumer, hopefully enhancing sales and profit margins.[29] During the interwar years, the impact of the spectacular window displays influenced the change in retailing. This marketing technique was a fundamental part of the modern consumer culture that everyone could enjoy regardless of class.
Marginalisation of Street Traders 1924
The fantastic shop windows also contributed to the increased marginalisation of the poorest street sellers. Those who traded on the streets had yet to be able to compete with the large department stores; they were seen as unwanted and unenticing to any customers who had to walk past on their way to the inviting department store. Councillor John Nield took his concerns about the deprivation and poverty of street traders to Liverpool City Council in 1924. He stated, ‘the motorcars of the idle rich are permitted to obstruct the busy thoroughfares, also the window displays of the shops causing the sidewalks to be blocked, this Council expresses its disapproval at the officious and despotic treatment inflicted on the hawkers and pedlars by the Police and Magistrates, prevented from selling the goods…they persecute a woman if she happens to stop within view of certain shops with her barrow of goods’.[30] The council instantly declined Nield’s criticisms, there was no place for street traders in Liverpool anymore.[31] With the rising image of the department store as being one that resembled an upper-class place to visit Liverpool Council, no doubt wanted to portray the city positively. Street traders would have brought the elegant aesthetic of the department store down, so to the council, the market traders in the street should be moved on.
With Benjamin’s understanding of the fanciful encounters of the modern city he saw the department store as showy and ostentatious in its approach.[32] These factors combined made it problematic for the smaller street traders to compete, particularly in their ability to stock diverse goods and deliver the same level of shopping luxury and service. Once busy with traders and customers, the streets sellers slowly lost their appeal as consumers moved towards the more convenient and attractive department stores. This transformation laid the groundwork for the retail model we see today.
Advertisement Campaigns from Department Stores 1932-1938
The use of newspaper advertisements helped to boost sales at department stores in the interwar period. Department store managers realised that investing in marketing their products through newspapers could help appeal to prospective customers. The concept around consumerism and remaining loyal to reliable stores originated by placing more importance on the role of advertising from the department stores. Such marketing strategies helped stores survive and flourish in the interwar period. Because of the rise in mass media marketing advertisements from Lewis’s, George Henry Lees and Bon Marche increased rapidly. Sixty-four advertisements were placed in the Liverpool Echo from all stores between January and February 1920 and one hundred in the same months of 1938.[33] An increase of over fifty per cent. The number of advertisements marketed in newspapers that were predominantly read by working-class people helped reinforce department stores as sites for all people to attend, regardless of class.
By 1932, advertisements published in the Liverpool Echo from department stores had increased significantly. Lewis’s placed fifty-seven adverts, George Henry Lees published twenty-one, and Bon Marche has slightly more with twenty-four. However, by 1938, the number of advertisements placed in the same newspaper had fallen, with Lewis’s placing thirty-six promotional ads, George Henry Lees had fourteen published, and Bon Marche published twenty ads.[34] This data shows that department stores had cornered the market for the working-class shopper. The decline in advertisements demonstrates that stores no longer had to rely on newspapers to sell their products because consumer confidence in the stores was high.
To appeal to a broader audience stores changed how they marketed their business. The glamour of Hollywood and theme-based events were used to entice more customers to their businesses. Department store managers became forward-thinking when thinking of advertising and marketing approaches.[35] In the later stages of the 1920s, department stores were offering their services to a broader range of customers and were turning their businesses from solely being places where purchasing could take place to spaces where customers could experience social pleasure. By the 1930s, with department stores using mass advertising in local newspapers to promote events such as Civic Week, they were now marketing their stores as leisure and entertainment sites. This slow change from the past elitist attitude surrounding stores is seen in the data from the popularity of restaurants at department stores. In 1933, George Henry Lee had 7,594 customers visiting their restaurant, signifying that stores had become not just places to experience shopping but were also places to relax and enjoy. From this information, it is clear that stores had become places for leisure and socialisation regardless of class.[36] This significant change to stores allowed businesses to market their approach to appeal to all their customers irrespective of class. Mass production and promotional marketing strategies mainly aimed at females encouraged women to seek out these products or copy the fashion trends they saw through such advertisements.
The department store as a place of elegance and luxury was established in the 1930s as managers targeted a broader consumer base. One promotional advertisement from Bon Marche promoted an array of coats, which elevated the sale of fur products in 1938. To appeal to all shoppers, the cost of the coats ranged from seven guineas to four hundred pounds. The advertisement offered a range of products from the ‘Delightful Box Coat’ to the ‘Dashing Swagger’. The use of squirrel was the most inexpensive of furs offered to customers. Such promotion shows that department store executives had considered the financial resources of all their customers.[37] By utilising a range of prices in the range of fur coats that were offered it allowed stores to attract a wide variety of women to their businesses regardless of their socio-economic circumstances. Offering this broad range of clothing presented the customers gave the customers a sense of lavish spending while offering a range of products that could be purchased within various pricing structures.
Fur was linked to ideas of extravagance, and by stores mass-producing cheaper furs, there was the sense that all women could purchase an item that aligned with their budgets. Promotions within newspapers displayed products available in stores and portrayed fur as a fashion statement. Fur being promoted as a status symbol by department stores within their marketing strategies to appeal to all classes of shoppers and establish their businesses as places where the wealthier and budget-conscious shoppers could come together.[38] By using advertising strategies tailored for their individual customers’ needs and by mass producing clothing cheaper than ever before, department stores were able to bring more luxurious products such as fur to consumers who wanted elegant looking clothing but at a price that they could afford.
Conclusion
The stimulation of economic growth in the city of Liverpool was brought to the fore by an increase in commercialism from department stores. Changes in culture saw shoppers wanting to replicate Hollywood glamour and the wealthy. Retailers capitalised on these transformations through mass marketing campaigns that became available through promotional strategies placed within local newspapers. Because department stores were able to mass-produce clothing at a relatively lower price, these cost-cutting savings trickled down to the consumer, allowing stores to sell products cheaper to a broad range of consumers regardless of class structure. The desire from consumers for social mobility transformed how department stores used mass marketing to sell their products. However, such mass-production expansion saw the home dressmakers decline because the mass-production saw department stores offering inexpensive clothing tailored to the working-class consumer at a reduced price. The department store’s ability to offer various products within one store appealed to consumers seeking the latest fashion trends.
Through the appeal of offering products at a cheaper price, stores were able to give the general impression of glamour and lavishness. Offering such products to working-class women allowed some females a sense of individuality and an escape from the domestic sphere and the societal expectations imposed on them. Department stores such as Bon Marche, George Henry Lees and Lewis’s were popular sites for working-class women and brought to the fore modern approaches to shopping that had previously only been available to middle- and upper-class shoppers. Overall, retailing in Liverpool during the interwar period saw an increase in consumerism brought about by modernity and innovative marketing practices that brought consumers to their stores.
[1] Peter Scott and James Walker. ‘Advertising, Promotion, and the Competitive Advantage of Interwar British Department Stores.’ The Economic History Review 4, no. 3 (2010), p. 1112.
[4] Selina Todd, ‘Young Women, Work, and Leisure in Interwar England.’ The Historical Journal 48, no. 3 (2005), p. 791.
[5] Peter Gurney, ‘The Battle of the Consumer in Postwar Britain’, The Journal of Modern History 77, no 4 (2005), pp. 961-983.
[6] Nancy L. Green, Ready to Wear Ready to Work, (London, 1997), p. 19.
[7] Asa Briggs, Friends of the People the Centenary History of Lewis’s, (London, 1956), p. 132.
[8] Pat Ayers, ‘The Hidden Economy of Dockland Families: Liverpool in the 1930s’, in ed. Pat Hudson and W. R. Lee, Women’s Work and the Family Economy in Historical Perspective, (Manchester, 1990), p. 279.
[9] Charlotte Wildman, Urban Redevelopment and Modernity in Liverpool and Manchester 1918-1939, (London, 2018), p. 86.
[11] Geraldine Howell, Wartime Fashion from Haute Couture to Homemade 1939-1945, (London, 2012), p. 19.
[12] Marlis Schweitzer, ‘The Mad Search for Beauty’: Actresses Testimonials, the Cosmetics Industry, and the ‘Democratization of Beauty’, The Journal of the Gilded Age and Progressive Era 3, no. 3 (2005), p. 270.
[13] Jeffrery Richards, The Age of the Dream Palace: Cinema and Society in Britain 1930-1939, (London, 1984), p. 11.
[14] Lindy Woodhead, Shopping Seduction and Mr Selfridge, (London, 2007), p. 163.
[15] Frederick Marquis, The Memoirs of the Rt Hon. The Earl of Woolton, (London, 1959), p. 104.
[17] Wildman, Urban Redevelopment and Modernity in Liverpool and Manchester 1918-1939, p. 64.
[18] Todd, ‘Young Women Work and Leisure in Interwar England’, p. 791-803.
[19] William R. Leach, ‘Transformations in a Culture of Consumption: Women and Department Stores, 1890-1925’, The Journal of American History 71, no. 2 (1984), pp. 321-336
[20] Elizabeth Gittus, ‘A Study of the Unemployed of Merseyside’, in Merseyside Social and Economic Studies, ed. Richard Lawton and Catherine M. Cunningham, (London, 1970), p. 125.
[21] Matt Houlbrook, ‘A Pin to See the Peepshow: Culture, Fiction and Selfhood in Edith Thompson’s Letters 1921-22’, Past & Present 207, no. 1 (2010), p. 223.
[22] Beverly Lemire, ‘Consumerism in Preindustrial and Early Industrial England: The Trade in Second-hand Clothes’, Journal of British Studies 27, no. 1 (1988), p. 3.
[23] Jess Berry, Fashion Capital: Style Economies, Sites and Cultures, (Oxford, 2012), p. 130.
[24] Mica Nava, ‘Modernity’s Disavowal: Women, the city and the Department Store’, in Modern Times: Reflections on a Century of English Modernity, ed, Mica Nava and Alan O’Shea, (London, 1996), p. 38-76.
This dissertation aims to discover if the rise of the working-class woman shopper in interwar Liverpool led to a culture of abundance by using a socio-economic approach to the research. The thesis is divided into four chapters. While this study focuses on the rise of the working-class woman shopper, the first chapter explains why Liverpool changed from a predominantly maritime city to a place that encouraged mass consumerism. There is also discussion on the mass production of garments and the effects this had on the smaller retailers. Women’s interest in Hollywood glamour is also discussed to show how cultural changes influenced the shopping experience. Using an autobiographical account from the Chairman of Lewis’s Department Store, Frederick Marquis, provides evidence to support the retail changes that were put in place by store managers to attract working-class women into their department stores. Overall, this study shows how consumerism and culture were transformed within the interwar period and how societal changes led to working-class women’s interest in modernity and consumerism.
Introduction
Retailing between the wars in Liverpool rapidly changed. From the single independent shops that mostly supplied consumer goods to their middle-class customers, to large department stores that focused on mass producing goods to a wider consumer base. Selling products under one roof became convenient for the shopper, with the rise of cheaper consumer goods, which was made possible through the mass production of goods. However, because of the financial recession during the 1930s consumer behaviour varied. One of the reason for this can be found in the economic failures at the Port of Liverpool and with the lack of employment available for many dock workers. The docks, once flourishing, now caused many men into a cycle of casualisation which meant that there was an increase of women who joined the workforce and for some this helped to bring about financial independence. Having a disposable income allowed some women to become influential in consumer markets. Such interests in retail did help to bring about a curiosity that extended beyond the department store, such as in Hollywood glamour and mass culture. Mass production did revolutionise the retail trade, transforming department stores in the products they could offer at a lower price than their nearest smaller competitors.
Department stores came to understand that women were vital if their businesses were going to be successful in the 1930s. Because more women were employed after World War I, it allowed a shift in the products marketed towards females. Marketing strategies were changed to accommodate the new working woman with the glamour that proved popular in Hollywood, and women wanting to replicate the looks of the actresses they came across at the cinema. Advertising and marketing increased significantly in the 1930s, and department stores became not only a place for consumerism but also a site for leisure and entertainment. Department stores used numerous ways of attracting new customers, such as the beautiful architecture of the buildings that housed their stores, the interior design, and excessive window displays to show what consumer items they could offer. Using department stores in this way allowed customers to socialise and entertain themselves; by inviting customers to fashion parades and promoting products. In Inviting film stars to stores, people could enter the retail sphere without spending money. The creative ways that store managers enticed customers helped to broaden consumer culture. With the increase in mass media, such as newspapers, radio, and women’s magazines, stores had the power to reach out to potential customers. The changes in consumerism in Liverpool during the interwar period showed that the rise of the working-class female shopper in Liverpool led to a culture of abundance.
Literature
Unemployment and Poverty Historiography
To understand the socio-economic activities in Liverpool during the interwar period, this thesis will include a chapter on the context that brought about a change in the Liverpool economy that turned the once thriving port city into a site of consumerism and culture. Joshua Civin, in the chapter, Slaves, Sati and Sugar: Constructing Imperial Identity through Liverpool Petition Struggles, concentrates his research on the transatlantic slave trade, but he does maintain that the construction of the Albert Dock, which occurred after the abolition of slavery, brought further wealth to the city. Helen B. McCartney offers a revisionist historiography in Citizen Soldiers: The Liverpool Territorials in the First World War, whichdiscusses ideas of isolation and injury for those soldiers who returned to the city after World War I and how this impacted the employment levels within Liverpool. Ian Gazeley, in Poverty in Britain 1900-1965, dissects the poverty levels in Merseyside from 1929-1930. This analysis focuses on how many people lived in poverty and why it was so prevalent. However, there are gaps in Gazeley’s research when examining how available poor aid was to those who needed help. Peter Fearon’s inquiry in A Social Evil Liverpool Moneylenders 1920-1940 shows the importance of researching the Moneylenders Act 1927. The rising poverty and predatory money lending that was taking place has allowed Fearon to analyse how the Moneylenders Act failed to bring stability for those who were reliant on community lending. A study carried out by Caradog Jones in The Social Survey of Merseyside helps comprehend families’ struggles with rising debt. Jones’s research uses quantitative data to illustrate people experiencing poverty in Liverpool. Jones’s information contains charts and statistics, but it needs to include literature detailing any personal accounts of deprivation. As a result, while the research is centred on the whole city, gaps in the literature are evident because of the failure to interview people who had experienced such deprivation.
Rise of the Shopping Experience Historiography
This study also aims to show the variations in the rise of the shopping experience and how department stores capitalised on societal changes to entice shoppers into their stores. Assessing Jeffrey Richards’s revisionist history in The Age of the Dream Palace: Cinema and Society in Britain 1930-1939 offers an analytical examination of the social and historical contexts. However, Richards must address whether class structures were a factor in attending the cinema. In Transformations in a Culture of Consumption Women and Department Stores 1890-1925, William Leach argues that department stores offered women a change from the domestic sphere. Leach’s research is predominantly about the American market in the rise of the cinema and how that affected the female shopper, but the same issues were evident in Liverpool, too. Matt Houlbrook brings forth the argument in A Pin to See the Peepshow: Culture, Fiction and Selfhood in Edith Thompson’s Letters 1921-22 that the rise of culture brought about a change in selfhood, bringing new perspectives, desires and encounters after World War I. Jess Berry supports this argument in Fashion Capital: Style Economies, Sites of Cultures, stating that fashion links together culture and commerce and this was regardless of the class structures that were already in place. Mica Nova theorises in the book chapter Modernity’s Disavowal, Women the City and the Department Store that women were not entirely restricted by the domestic sphere with females creating space for themselves in department stores caused through store managers directing their advertising strategies at the working-class female shopper with schemes that would influence consumer markets.
Behind the Scenes of Retailing Historiography
While it is important to examine the transformations for customers in retailing, it is equally important to understand the shifts in mass marketing and production and how these changes impacted the department store. James B. Jeffreys, in Retail Trading in Britain 1850-1950, believes that the chain store’s introduction was more important than the department store in the interwar era. This theory supports the analysis by Victoria De Grazia in Irresistible Empire: America’s Advance through Twentieth Century Europe. De Grazia’s work focuses on American ideas on retailing. She does argue that British department stores struggled to adapt to the changes in consumerism. Both debates go against the discussion in this thesis that Liverpool’s department stores succeeded in the interwar period.
From High Culture to Mass Culture in Liverpool Historiography
This paper will also investigate the impacts of high culture in Liverpool and how it developed into mass culture through the interwar years. A. J. P. Taylor, in English History 1914-1945, observed the 1930s and saw that society was struggling with deep levels of deprivation, but he could also see the country’s wealth and believed that Britain had never been so affluent. In Love on the Dole, Walter Greenwood studies the notion that shoppers could participate in the fashion trends that were taking place because the manufacturing of products became less costly. These discussions help to support this thesis that the mass manufacturing of culture and products was feasible in Liverpool’s city centre because of the production developments that were created.
Methodology
In order to understand the effects of department stores on the economy in interwar Liverpool, this thesis will use a socio-economic method to examine the consumer changes that took place in Liverpool at the time. Using a socio-economic methodology for this study is limited in its approach owing to the research period. Problems that arose include data collection challenges when analysing statistics focused on unemployment and poverty ratios. There were also concerns about using data in the 1940s and 1950s because of reliability concerns, with statistics being based on averages.
Using a socio-economic method allows this thesis to examine the context of unemployment and poverty in Liverpool and how both issues were crucial in changing consumerism. From this perspective, this study will show how the rise of consumer culture helped accelerate the advances in mass production and how consumers adapted to such reforms. The socio-economic model also helps to explain the changes that were made in the welfare of the workforce and how this helped to run an effective business. The academic scholarship surrounding ideas around retail needs to be expanded significantly on the transformations that department stores were able to achieve, which brought about economic stability.
Charlotte Wildman, who concentrated on the shopping culture that increased in Liverpool during the interwar period despite the economic downturn in her book Urban Redevelopment and Modernity in Liverpool and Manchester 1918-1939,achieved a great amount of scholarship on this topic. Despite this, more analysis is needed on the changes that department stores carried out to achieve financial stability in the city. Such as how much money did department stores make per year, and this will help researchers unearth if department stores were successful in helping Liverpool’s recovery from the financial instability of the Great Depression. As this research concentrates on a timescale of a hundred years past, there are limitations due to the inability to interview those who experienced the rise of consumerism in the interwar period. However, by analysing newspaper articles of the time, this study can successfully investigate the unemployment levels and how deeply rooted poverty was in Liverpool. Articles detailing the casualisation of the workforce at Liverpool docks detail the despair of the unemployed and help us understand why there was a need for economic change in the city. With the fall of dressmakers and small independent retailers in urban areas, statistics effectively strengthen the debate that department stores became more popular in the city centre.
An essential primary source utilised in this study is the biography of Lewis’s chairman, Frederick Marquis. He articulates his plans to turn around Liverpool’s finances through consumerism and improve the welfare of workers at his store. The insight from Marquis is vital because it shows how department stores used the mass production of their goods to appeal to everyone regardless of class. Advertisements placed in newspapers are also scrutinised to show how department stores enticed the consumer to their stores through mass media. Analysing articles published in magazines such as Lucille of Liverpool shows how the media’s attitudes changed towards female shoppers. With the exhibition of Mrs Tinne’s Wardrobe at Liverpool’s Walker Art Gallery, we can understand that some women From the upper classes used shopping as a hobby, which led to feelings of empowerment through fashion and consumerism.
Chapter One
Unemployment and Poverty in Liverpool 1920 – 1934
Introduction
The purpose of this study is to provide context for the reasons why the economy of Liverpool changed during the interwar period. Decline within Liverpool docks brought about mass unemployment in Liverpool. This thesis will explain the decline and how people struggled to cope in the interwar period to support themselves and their families. There is a need to understand what happened to bring about these changes so the city could become financially viable. The outcome of this thesis will help scholars better understand the reasons why Liverpool had to change from a place of maritime that focused on the docks to an area of commercialisation, which brought about the rise in consumerism. Although there is scholarship on the independent points raised in this chapter, there needs to be more academic literature on the broader topic of Liverpool switching from maritime to consumer culture for financial gain. The scholarship discussed by McCartney analyses the impact of World War I on the residents of Liverpool such as the shortage of workers available because men were being conscripted for war.
Using statistics published in the Liverpool Echo the thesis analyses the unemployment rates during the interwar period and how some people in authority played down this increase. Gazeley has analysed the Pilgrim Trust’s visit to Liverpool and discovered that this led to a significant increase in impoverishment in the city due to rising unemployment levels. These high rates of poverty allow this thesis to explore the response from many women who handled domestic expenditure and, when struggling with debt, resorted to community lending. O’Connell and Fearon have researched how moneylending impacted communities and families in Liverpool during the 1930s, and to support their investigation, The Moneylending Act 1927 is explored in this study to explain the ways moneylending was seen as a predatory act that caused further financial hardships to many families in the city. The discussions put forward in this chapter examine the financial problems that some families in Liverpool faced when it came to the high poverty rates, and this helps to reinforce why Liverpool had to transform its finances to stabilise the city’s economy.
Decline of the Docks 1922-1932
The imported trade that sailed into Liverpool’s Docks shows how the city’s economy had changed since the nineteenth century. Along with the developments of steam power and transportation links, it helped Liverpool’s docklands to become bustling with warehouses and shipyards.[1] According to Civin, The construction of the Albert Dock in 1846 helped to solidify Liverpool’s dominance as a port city after the abolition of slavery in 1807 caused the port’s economy to decrease.[2] Because of Liverpool’s position within the slave trade the abolition of slavery impacted on Liverpool’s economy. There was now a need for change and diversification. To bring an end to the economic decline and divert attention away from the ending of the slave trade, the construction of the Albert Dock took place. It was a ground-breaking project for its time and served to accommodate heavier ships and generate an efficient way to import freight.
Hydraulic cranes and warehouses directly on Liverpool’s waterfront brought about an increase in improved machinery. The primary purpose was to create a new wave of trade and show that Liverpool could be an economical port city without having to rely on the slave trade to enhance its economy.[3] Although the construction of the Albert Dock was impressive, it cannot be said to have independently solidified Liverpool’s dominance as a port city. The end of the slave trade and the structural changes in the global economy were the primary reasons for the decrease in the port’s economy. Additionally, the construction of the Albert Dock did not address the significant concern that affected the economy of Liverpool’s Docks. Competition from other seaports was high, with cities such as London, Bristol and Glasgow also adjusting to the changes in the economic landscape. Liverpool’s port was losing trade to other cities and towns at a rate of 0.2 per cent yearly.[4] The 0.2 per cent annual decrease in trade indicates that the port of Liverpool was affected by changes in shipping routes and the slowing down of the economy.
The interwar years were turbulent for the dockyards. By 1924 Liverpool’s port imported ninety-five per cent of raw cotton. By 1931, this had fallen to sixty-seven per cent. According to research by Allen and Hyde et al., the imports of cotton never rose above seventy per cent after 1931.[5] One reason for the port’s failure to thrive was because of the downturn in trade. Hence, unemployment began to rise within the port, with those who were employed as carters and storekeepers struggling to maintain their roles at the docks. Port exports declined, too. Research by Smith and Monkhouse et al., states that at its peak, exports stood at £480 million in 1920 but fell to £234 million in 1922. By 1932, this had reduced further to £103 million.[6] Because of the decline in shipping exports, the demand for raw materials fell and this negatively affected the shipping manufacturing industry which decreased across the city.
Hatton and Thomas, in their research, explain that the high levels of unemployment were brought about because of the decline in dockyard activity. To both, the problems that arose in cities and towns were regional. In areas such as cotton, coal, and shipbuilding, for instance it became evident because the production of such trades belonged to specific areas in the United Kingdom that the issues were contained to certain parts of the country.[7] In 1931, Keynes argued that the world was ‘in the middle of the greatest economic catastrophe…of the modern world…there is a possibility that when the crisis is looked back upon by the economic historians of the future it will be seen to mark one of the major turning points.[8] Writing in 1960 H. R. Poole who worked for Liverpool Council of Social Service argued that any ambitions that Liverpool had after World War I of rebuilding the city were hindered by the economic downturn of the 1930s. Because Liverpool was so reliant on its docks, many industries were affected by the high unemployment rates.[9] Such a decline in dockyard labour saw demand for imports and exports shrink, leading to mass unemployment and economic decline and with the onset of the Great Depression the people of Liverpool fell further into debt. Because of Liverpool’s dependence on industries that suffered during the financial recession, Liverpool’s economic suffering was felt twofold.
The Impact of World War I on Liverpool’s Docks 1914-1918
Liverpool docks were fundamental to the World War I war effort, strategically and economically, and assisted in communications and freight. The port was also utilised by serving soldiers and nurses as a transportation point, with people from commonwealth nations using the docks as a route to the WWI battlefields.[10] The placement of Liverpool as a significant port allowed many naval vessels to reside in the docks during their defence of the maritime trade routes against the threat of the German U-boats. Liverpool Maritime Museum reports that the number of ships on the Mersey increased to keep Britain supplied with food and other essential goods for the war effort.[11] However, work at the Docks during World War I did not always run smoothly with the port suffering with a shortage of workers. According to the Liverpool Echo, large food consignments lay untouched because of the need for dock labourers. The Dock Labour Joint Committee removed restrictions on any man who could effectively do the work, such was the desperation of the committee for an effective workforce.[12] Although, McCarney critically evaluates how Liverpool’s port contributed to the war effort and how the conflict impacted on the city in the long term. During the interwar period, Liverpool faced significant hardships caused by the economic difficulties and the rebuilding process of the social upheaval of soldiers returning from the war who were often wounded and required support once back home.[13] The challenges that occurred here shaped the transformations that the city undertook during the interwar period and helped to bring about the rise in consumerism that occurred away from the dockyards.
Unemployment rates in Liverpool 1922-1934
At the end of 1924, 26,861 men were unemployed in the city of Liverpool. Mr William B Potts, manager of the Liverpool Administrative Exchange, in an article with the Liverpool Echo, stated that the ‘figures were certainly depressing but one must take into account the population of the city’.[14]
Potts’ point was that 818,435 people were living in Liverpool at the time.[15] Hence an unemployment rate of almost 27,000 was not a big problem. Potts also believed that such a downward turn usually happened after Christmas.[16] However, by 1934, this figure had reached 58,000 people who were unemployed and in receipt of benefits. According to an article in the Liverpool Echo from 1934, 84,301 people were receiving aid from the Liverpool Public Assistance Committee.[17]
Using dockworkers as an example, research by Bean states that from 1861 to 1889, the number of dockworkers was 24,000.[18] Yet the Labour Gazette published in 1922, states that the number of employees that worked on the docks had fallen to 14,578.[19] According to the Liverpool Daily Post, poor relief statistics showed that 50,210 people in the area were receiving domiciliary relief with 23,735 of those people in receipt of the benefit being classed as unemployed. People receiving relief under the poor law was 667 per 10,000 compared with 286 per 10,000 for England and Wales for 1931-2.[20]
Caradog Jones’s research states that by 1932, unemployment in Liverpool was 108,000 – twenty-eight per cent for the whole city with nearly one in three of the working population in Liverpool being unemployed.[21] Few men were able to find a whole week’s work with those who did find employment usually working for three days. Those who could not find employment usually arrived at the docks, hoping they would be chosen for work that day.
Those registered as unemployed dock workers would have to attend the docks every day to receive benefits. Searching for employment without success made these men feel like a failure.[22] From 1921, dockers who were registered were able to claim statutory unemployment benefit if they did not work for more than three days per week. Some did exploit this system by ensuring that they only worked for half of the working week, knowing that they could then claim unemployment benefits. In 1929, three-quarters of registered dockers received government help.[23] Men who could work were trapped within a cycle of unemployment, casualisation and low wages, which brought uncertainty to their lives – the connection between the financial systems and social settings emphasised the circumstances in Liverpool at the time. Not only did working-class men struggle with the unpredictability of the unemployment rates and low wages, but this also profoundly affected their families and communities.
The situation was no better for women who struggled with gender discrimination and low levels of pay. Roles in nursing, domestic service and household duties saw women carrying out menial jobs that were undervalued within society. There was not much opportunity for women to progress in paid employment with statistics showing that by 1931 only thirty-six per cent of women aged fourteen plus were in employment. However, in some employment sectors women flourished. Areas such as retail and clerical roles saw women entering the workplace and earning a weekly wage. Although wages were low for those women who were living with their families it offered a level of economic independence.[24] Poverty levels were high and many families struggled with unemployment with people taking causal work to at least have some money to stop themselves from slipping further into deprivation.
Poverty and the effects of casualisation 1929-1932
The lack of employment meant that workers were forced to apply for any lowly paid work that became available to them. An article in The Daily Herald in April 1929 described a ‘disturbance’ at Wapping Dock. The owners of the S.S., Scottish Prince, were looking for casual labourers to work on their fruit steamer, resulting in five hundred men applying for the two hundred available jobs. After selecting a workforce, fighting broke out, such was the desperation of the men applying for work to provide for their families. The article states that the crowd shouted, ‘We want work’ and ‘Remember our families’. The employers of S.S, Scottish Prince prioritised their workforce by offering employment to those men who had a sustained amount of unemployment and those who had to provide for their families.[25]
Men who managed to gain employment were classed as casual workers with contracts that would only last a month. The effects of a casualisation workforce meant that by 1932, families were living with extreme poverty levels, a conclusion that the Pilgrim trust drew on their visit to the city in the 1930s. What the trust discovered was that there was a connection between slum living in the inner-city areas of Liverpool and high poverty rates.[26] According to data discovered by Gazeley, the population rate in Liverpool in 1931 was 846,1010 but with many living in slum housing there were concerns over occupants being unwell and thus being unable to look for work through illness.[27] It was a cycle of desperation that those living in appalling housing conditions could not free themselves from. There were high unemployment rates for men aged eighteen to thirty-five who had to support their large families with dependent children. With three hundred and twenty-four children for every one hundred men in the city. The Pilgrim Trust were damning in their report on Liverpool and stated that it was rooted in high levels of deprivation, with many families not being able to run their homes effectively.[28] Slum housing was characterised by the lack of basic facilities such as overcrowding, lack of sanitation and inadequate housing and with the lack of employment and the links to slum living this meant that the needs of families could not be successfully met which then brought about a never-ending cycle of poverty that was difficult to escape from. The desperation of those living in such abject poverty made it extremely difficult to find employment because of the conditions they were living in.
The role of Women in managing their household expenditure
Families dealing with high poverty levels looked at other ways of supplementing their income. Usually, household expenditure management fell to married women who had to stretch their incomes for items such as clothing, groceries, and rental payments. When times were difficult for families, community support became invaluable to those in need. To navigate these difficult times, women relied on support from their neighbours, friends and family to ensure their families were cared for. There was a sense of community spirit amongst neighbourhoods, with women providing meals for their needy neighbours, watching their budget, and stretching their income as far as possible. Women, too, had to be imaginative when it came to supplementing their household income, with many resorting to working from home in trades such as sewing or taking in laundry for a small income. Such jobs allowed women to remain in the family home while obtaining an income. Women were also able to grow their own food and breed poultry to cut down on the amount of food they bought from independent shops.[29] Although the role of women within the domestic sphere is often overlooked in the debates surrounding unemployment, they did experience multiple hardships as they struggled to support their families. Recognising their resilience as they navigated through such challenging times is essential.
The Cycle of Debt through Moneylending
For those who were living below the poverty line and were facing unemployment there was no choice but to pawn what small amounts they owned or borrow money from family and friends. For certain people who did have money set aside they began moneylending businesses to assist those who were in need. Most of the time, the people who ran these organisations were women who had set up their financial businesses from their homes.[30] Using a moneylender helped pay household expenditures. It was primarily women who found themselves slipping further into debt to cover these costs, usually without the knowledge of their families because of the shame that financial hardship would bring.[31] Although this type of credit helped those families who were in financial need it did bring about a cycle of debt because many people struggled to pay back what was borrowed with interest. One example of how difficult it was for families to avoid the poverty trap can be seen in Jones’ research. For men who had left the family home and were working at sea, their employers made a weekly contribution to their wives. In 1931, such payments were one pound and five shillings, not enough money to support a family. In this respect running up debts and seeking support from a moneylender was the only option for some women who felt like they had no choice.[32] In order to run a successful moneylending business it was vital to know who lived in the local area and who exactly was lending money. One way to achieve this was through networking within the local community. This could be achieved through local shopping trips or visits to places such as launderettes. Such visits allowed women to exchange information on who could offer credit and also for moneylenders to whom not to lend money.[33] For those women who did want to borrow, there was a need for confidentiality, and seeking out information at sites that women mostly occupied allowed women to obtain information from others who had experiences with moneylending.
Because of the trust concerns moneylenders mostly lent money to those they knew or had a family connection to. This was because most of those who borrowed from someone they were familiar with had a minimal risk of defaulting on a loan. Another way a moneylender would loan money would be because the borrower was of the same religious faith. However, ultimately, what allowed a moneylender to decide to loan money came down to how creditworthy the borrower was and if they had any income that would allow them to repay their debt, including any benefits received from the national government. Moneylending practices were inconsistent and predatory. For those people who did not know the moneylender personally proof of a rent book or employment would be enough to allow borrowing to take place.[34] According to O’Connell allowing borrowing to take place within the community boosted social cohesion and brought about a support network for those who were struggling financially.[35] However, privacy for those wanting to borrow could not be guaranteed because communities knew were moneylenders lived. There was shame associated with this kind of borrowing. Lending in this way was usually carried out by those with low socioeconomic status and accepting support from a moneylender was seen as a last resort because it also came with high-interest rates.
The exceptional unemployment rates for those people who faced financial hardships meant they were less likely to want to resort to borrowing money. Intervention from the government using policies that would help those struggling with poverty offered support without relying on exploitative moneylending practices.[36] The need for benefits or emergency credit reveals the economic problems that working-class families had to deal with during the interwar period. However, because of the high unemployment rates, receiving benefits was essential for survival for some families.
The Money Lending Act of 1927
In order to protect people who were vulnerable to predatory moneylending within communities, the government introduced the Money Lenders Act of 1927. The act ensured lenders were licenced and attempted to stop the extreme interest rates.[37] The act was criticised for not protecting people enough against excessive moneylending. Vulnerable borrowers still had to contend with extreme debt because the act did not stop the high-interest rates or limit how much people could borrow. The governing body responsible for the act’s administration did not successfully assess the predatory lending practices that were still taking place. This meant that moneylenders remained unregulated and faced no consequences of forcing borrowers to pay high-interest rates. The act was a failure because it did not protect the borrower as it offered no consumer education, which may have given people the opportunity to make educated decisions on the lending practices.[38] Because potential borrowers were not informed about such practices, there were concerns that people would continue to struggle with their economic difficulties.
Conclusion
The downturn in employment and Liverpool’s dock during the interwar period damaged the local economy because the decrease in imports and exports created mass unemployment and economic decline. The financial downturn and the unreliability of the available jobs created a constant state of uncertainty for many dock workers. The cycle of debt that people found themselves in increased the poverty rates and impacted people’s mental well-being. Research into the effects of economic uncertainty emphasises the need to discuss the systematic concerns that people were facing at the time, such as employment unpredictability and concerns about low-paid incomes. Changes to the overall economy, such as the Great Depression of the 1930s, poor government assistance and the individual poverty that followed all brought a rise in the hopelessness people felt when dealing with such deprivation. However, despite the difficulties that families encountered, the resilience of women was evident as they supported their families through turbulent times.
Furthermore, women challenged social norms and established their autonomy by borrowing money, which became crucial to networking in working-class areas. While this unauthorised method brought women a support network when dealing with financial problems, it also brought limitations. Without education to make informed economic decisions, people experienced a cycle of borrowing, which led to further economic decline. Addressing these concerns through education and placing restrictions on community lending was a way to stop vulnerable people from slipping further into deprivation.
Because of the unemployment levels and extreme poverty that some people experienced, Liverpool had to reinvent itself as a city to become a place of consumerism during the interwar period. The city’s capability to adapt to the demands of the consumer helped to bring about economic growth and, with that, brought employment prospects. Nevertheless, it is essential to investigate the disparities from placing so much prominence on consumerism and the consequences of an economy so reliant on consumer spending.
[1] J. E. Allison, ‘The Development of Merseyside and the Port of Liverpool’, The Town Planning Review, 24, no. 1 (1953): pp. 60–72.
[2] Joshua Civin, ‘Slaves, sati and sugar: constructing imperial identity through Liverpool petition struggles’ in Parliament, Nations and Identities in Britain and Ireland 1660-1850, eds. Julian Hoppit, (Manchester, 2003), p. 191.
[3] Paul Ingram, and Brian S. Silverman, ‘The Cultural Contingency of Structure: Evidence from Entry to the Slave Trade In and Around the Abolition Movement’, American Journal of Sociology 3, no. 3 (2016), pp. 755-797.
[4]Members of Merseyside Socialist Research Group, Genuinely Seeking Work, (Liverpool, 1992), p. 13-4.
[5] G.C. Allen, F. E. Hyde, et al., The Import Trade of the Port of Liverpool, (Liverpool, 1946), pp. 20-1.
[6] Winfred Smith, F. J. Monkhouse, et al, Merseyside A Scientific Survey British Association for the Advancement of Science, (Liverpool, 1953), p. 162.
[7] Nicholas Crafts and Peter Fearon, ‘Lessons from the 1930s Great Depression’, Oxford Review of Economic Policy 26, no. 2 (2010), p. 287.
[32] Caradog Jones, The Social Survey of Merseyside, p. 85.
[33] Fearon, ‘A Social Evil Liverpool Moneylenders 1920s-1940s’, p. 441-2.
[34] Fearon, A Social Evil: Liverpool Moneylenders 1920-1940, pp. 440-455.
[35] Sean O’Connell, Credit and Community Working Class Debt in the UK since 1880, (New York, 2009), pp. 162-5.
[36] P Thane, ‘The Welfare State and the Labour Market’, in Work and Pay in Twentieth Century Britain, ed. N. Crafts, I Gazeley and A Newell(Oxford, 2007), pp.186-8.
[37] H. Hone, Ralph, N. Paschalis, and C. J. Colombos. ‘Mediterranean’, Journal of Comparative Legislation and International Law 16, no. 3 (1934), p.176.
[38] Fearon, A Social Evil: Liverpool Moneylenders 1920-1940, pp. 449-461.
During the rise of Beatlemania in 1963-4 female fans of The Beatles became known for their emotional displays of enthusiasm, which included screaming and fainting. This phenomenon was labelled ‘Beatlemania’ and spread across the world. Some people, often from the older generations with a conservative outlook, disregarded the fans’ reaction as a passing trend. However, the involvement of females in Beatlemania was shaped by many influences that dominated the 1960s, one being the rise of second-wave feminism. Teenage girls were drawn to The Beatles because they symbolised an image of defiance and rebellion, which was associated with countercultural movements of the time. The enthusiastic responses of the fans brought about challenges to the traditional gender norms where women were expected to be obedient and concentrate on their roles as mothers and wives. The media interest surrounding Beatlemania depicted the fans as hysterical and irrational in their attempts to support gender stereotypes. The rise of television in the early 1960s also played an essential role in the emergence of Beatlemania. It is widely accepted in the scholarship that the rise of The Beatles’ fame and the increasing popularity of television is linked. In terms of Beatlemania television helped to develop a sense of closeness between the band and the fans, with hordes of girls believing that they knew the band through what they saw of them on the television. From the closeness the fans felt towards The Beatles, there was a growing awareness of community and having something to belong to in the form of buying merchandise and forming fan clubs such as The Beatles Book Monthly. Nevertheless, like anything in a consumer-rich society, fads come and go, and that was undoubtedly true for Beatlemania, although its legacy is still discussed today.
By 1964 Beatlemania made headline news as it swept across Britain in a movement that empowered young females to show their emotions publicly. Such displays of emotion went against the societal norm of the self-contained, reserved nature of their parents, who were raised with a more conservative outlook after World War II.[1] Because of this conflict between the older generations and the youth of the 1960s it was not unusual for fans of The Beatles to be labelled brainwashed by people and commentators who did not understand the fans commitment and excitement. Some adults believed that their children were thoughtlessly following a cultural faze that would end when the next obsession arrived. Journalist Auberon Waugh believed that fans would grow out of Beatlemania.[2] However, many fans of The Beatles and scholars of cultural history argue that adults at the time believed that fans were brainwashed, but this was unjustified as it overlooks the emotional sentiment that the fans felt for the band. It also disregards the creative influence that the band had on the females who worshipped them. Gould, in his book, Can’t Buy Me Love: The Beatles, Britain, and America, disputes that the music and image of The Beatles helped to unite the cultural divide between the United Kingdom and America throughout the 1960s and had a lasting impression on popular music, culture and of course the fans at the time who were looking for an escape from the more conservative traditions of their parents.[3] Gould does not go far enough in his analysis of The Beatles fans. It can be argued that the fans showed their emotions at concerts in order to honour themselves and the freedom that they were creating for themselves.[4] Scholars can now dissect the hordes of fans who expressed themselves by screaming and losing their self-control at Beatle concerts in the 1960s as symbolising more than just enthusiasm for the band and their music. The fans expressed themselves in this manner to rebel against the more conservative societal norms of the time. Establishing their independence and fighting against the expectations that were placed upon them by society through concerts and music allowed female fans to be distracted by youth culture and escape their everyday lives.
It is difficult to analyse fan participation without calling into question the role that second-wave feminism played in Beatlemania. Because of 1960s feminism, it was possible to understand fan behaviour as a form of revolution against the traditional gender norms of the time. According to Muncie, the rise of the overly passionate Beatles fan was the earliest and most spectacular rebellion of the women’s movement.[5] It is difficult to argue against this critique of the Beatle fandom because although female fans of Elvis, for instance, had behaved in the same way it was not on a global scale, as Elvis did not perform outside of America and Hawaii.[6] Laurie described Beatlemania as a release for the fans to escape from the limited role that they had available to them in the United Kingdom.[7] This is true for many female fans, their obsession with The Beatles provide an opportunity to resist societal expectations of passivity. By taking an active role in The Beatle fandom, females were establishing their identity and claiming their space in an otherwise predominately male-controlled realm.[8] In this sense, the rise of second-wave feminism brought about better insight into the foundations of Beatlemania and how the phenomenon could now acknowledge the agency and empowerment of the young female fans.
The emotional impact the Beatles had over their female fanbase was nothing short of extraordinary. For females who were disappointed with 1960s society, The Beatles could connect with their audience on a highly personal level and became a source of hope and inspiration for a generation of people that were finding it difficult to find their place in society.[9] It can be argued that what catapulted The Beatles to stardom was the rise of the television. By 1958 fifty-two per cent of homes owned or had rented a television set. The figure was ninety per cent by 1970.[10] The television became a staple source of entertainment for many homes each night. The Beatles first appeared on British television in 1962, coinciding with commercial television’s increasing popularity. The regular appearances of The Beatles on television shows did massively promote their profile and generate a sense of familiarity to their ever-expanding fanbase.[11] Inglis takes this analysis a step further by stating that The Beatles on television was very brief, but what television did for the fans was to spread the idea of Beatlemania throughout Britain. This spread of emotion impacted upon society from the very early days of The Beatles’ career.[12] What helped to spread Beatlemania was the growth of television. A critical factor in the rising interest in television was post-war Britain’s changing social and economic circumstances. After WWII, people were now searching for a distraction, and television offered a much-needed escape from the worries of everyday life. Furthermore, the rising prosperity of British society in the 1960s and 1960s allowed more people to afford televisions at the time.[13] Beatlemania would not have spread so fast without the rise in television. It is highly doubtful that the screaming fans would have impacted the early 1960s as much as they did if such technology did not exist.
The Beatles were one of the first bands to sell merchandise; this included clothing, lunch boxes, posters and even Beatle wigs and shoes were available to buy.[14] The increase in manufacturing brought about a sense of community, and many of these items can be found in the Beatles Museum at the Albert Dock in Liverpool for fans of all ages to enjoy.[15] The most significant influence though on bringing fans together was the publication of Beatle Book Monthly. This Monthly magazine dedicated itself to the band and the fans alike. What is noticeable from these publications is that at the magazines launch, female fans had letters published that appeared innocent and humorous, with one fan, Christine Kettle from Surrey, describing an accident she had while attempting to listen to the band. She said in the first-ever magazine publication, ‘I heard you singing Roll over Beethoven. I rushed to turn the wireless up, tripped, lost my shoe, and broke my toenail. Now I can hardly walk as my foot is hurting so bad so I think that your autograph would compensate for my disablement’.[16] Another letter in the tenth edition of Beatle Book Monthly was quite the opposite and more critical against Beatlemania. The letter anonymously suggested that the ‘Beatles give you more attention if you don’t scream yourself hoarse’. This is because the band were filming in the West Country. As these fans behaved themselves, the band had a sensible conversation with the people who had come to see them.[17] Although written anonymously, this shows that maybe not everyone was supportive of the emotional outpouring from fans. The band themselves did not enjoy the hysteria that followed them with the hordes of screaming females tracking their every move. The Beatles could no longer tour because of the screaming fans, and their last performance on stage was at Candlestick Park, San Francisco, in 1966. Moretta describes the end of the Beatles’ touring as a conclusion to Beatlemania, with the band struggling with their mental health. In order to continue recording, the concerts had to stop.[18] Paul McCartney believed touring had become pointless because ‘the fans were just screaming so much that nobody could hear us, so we just had to mime the songs’.[19] George Harrison too felt overwhelmed by Beatlemania stating that ‘It made me nervous, the whole magnitude of our fame’. To George, it was difficult to focus on his music and personal life during Beatlemania’s height. However, he recognised that it was a unique experience and one that would not be experienced again.[20] With the increase of merchandise and publications such as Beatles Book Monthly, which The Beatles endorsed, it is difficult to accept that the band struggled with the fame associated with Beatlemania in the long term. The merchandise was an essential element of the band’s image and how they were portrayed to the fans. The Beatles and their management made money from the fan base. Without the fans, the band would not have had the success that they achieved at the height of Beatlemania.
Obsessions surrounding The Beatles could not last in the long term. Writer George Melly in his book Revolt into Style, believed that The Beatles reflected a teenage disillusionment with the society that their parent belonged to, although this hostility was not felt in a long time because, as consumers, fans are constantly being exploited. Musical styles change with fans moving on to the next craze.[21] According to Beatle biographer Hunter Davies, the hero-worshipping of stars had happened before. It will happen again, but nobody had anything close to what Beatlemania was like. He doubted that they would again.[22] One book that documents the fan experience of Beatlemania is Patricia Gallo-Stenman’s Diary of a Beatlemaniac. The book documents the rise of Beatlemania from the perspective of a thirteen year old female.[23] It is a rich primary source. However, because the scholarship surrounding female fans is not well researched, historians face challenges when accessing any standalone personal narratives because it can offer such a restricted approach. Within the historiography, scholars of Rock and Roll music analyse bands. However, it mostly fails to consider the fanbase, so scholars turn to sociologists and behavioural experts to build a picture of what Beatlemania was like at the time.
During the height of Beatlemania, many people, such as parents, journalists, politicians, and religious leaders, saw The Beatles as a threat to younger generations mainly because females were now showing their emotions in public, which was seen as a negative in post-war Britain. Teenage girls were considered to be part of a mindless mob that was out of control, all behaving in the same way. But there was the real sense that once the girls grew up, the hysteria surrounding Beatlemania would calm down. The media also helped fuel the rise in this moral panic. It can be argued that the media’s reaction to Beatlemania helped to promote the phenomenon further. Hall and Whannel argue that to the fans, Beatlemania was fun. However, to outsiders such as the media, the behaviour of the fans was seen as a provocation, with females being unable to be controlled. There was moral pressure on society to clamp down on such excess behaviour. However, the fans were breaking away from societal norms and to many, it was to be seen as a game to be noticed by the band or the media.[24] American Journalist and critic of consumerism Vance Packard wrote an article for the American Magazine Saturday Evening Post in 1964 writing about Beatlemania he is quoted as saying ‘The youngster in the darkened audiences can let go all inhibitions in a quite primitive sense when The Beatles cut loose. They can retreat from rationality and individuality. Mob pathology takes over, and they have momentarily freed of all civilization’s restraints’.[25] Packard’s analysis successfully outlines what society was like during Beatlemania. In one respect, there were female fans who wanted to find their path in life and free themselves from the shackles of their parents, who had a more conservative upbringing. Some parents believed that their daughters were socially dysfunctional, which threatened how young females should behave under conservative ideology in the 1960s.
In conclusion, Beatlemania helped female fans break free from societal expectations, helping them escape from their traditional societal roles. Being part of a fandom allowed Beatles fans to express themselves freely without fear of judgement from outsiders. During the early 1960s, women were expected to be passive, but Beatlemania gave them a sense of liberation. The media and society often dismissed Beatlemania as superficial, and females could not understand that they were essentially brainwashed to follow a fad; because of this, many women began to scrutinise their association with popular culture and investigate new ways to express themselves. In this context, it is clear that Beatlemania was not just a passing phase but a powerful representation of female empowerment. Through Beatlemania, women were asserting a space for themselves in a culture that usually ignored them. However, this empowerment was only possible with the rise of television in the 1960s. Beatlemania may have spread slower without this technology. However, because television brought the band into people’s homes, it allowed Beatlemania to spread rapidly through the UK and then the USA. The merchandise carefully crafted by The Beatles’ management was an essential factor in Beatlemania. Items bought generated a sense of community among fans. Although not all females were connected to Beatlemania. Some women rejected this culture and believed those who followed The Beatles as a music group should obey the more conservative values of femininity. Beatlemania did decrease over time when the band stopped performing live and moved into the recording studio. However, it can be argued that Beatlemania brought about a substantial change in social norms as young females started to challenge the conservative values of their parents and sought greater independence and individuality. Beatlemania’s lasting impact is a testament to the young females who experienced the cultural phenomenon and how these fans shaped society and culture at the time.
[1] Michael Grossberg, ‘Liberation and Caretaking: Fighting over Children’s rights in Post War America’, in Paula S Fass and Michael Grossberg (ed)., Reinventing Childhood After World War II (Pennsylvania, 2012), p. 10.
[2] Marcus Collins, The Beatles, and Sixties Britain (Cambridge, 2020), p. 126.
[3] Jonathan Gould, Can’t Buy Me Love (London, 2007), p. 66.
[4] Kenneth Womack and Kit O’Toole, Fandom, and the Beatles (Oxford, 2021), p. 155.
[5] John Muncie, ‘The Beatles and the Spectacle of Youth’ in Ian Inglis (ed)., The Beatles, Popular Music and Society (Hampshire, 2000), p. 42.
[6] Erika Doss, ‘Elvis Forever’, in Steve Jones and Joli Jenson (ed)., After Life as Afterimage Understanding Posthumous Fame (New York, 2005), p. 58.
[7] Marcus Collins, The Beatles, and Sixties Britain (Cambridge, 2020), p. 66.
[8] Laurel Sercombe, ‘Ladies and Gentlemen…The Beatles: The Ed Sullivan Show, CBS TV, February 9, 1964’ in Ian Inglis (ed)., Performance and popular Music History Time and Place (Oxon, 2006), p. 14.
[9] Christine Feldman-Barrett, A Women’s History of The Beatles (London, 2022), p. 42.
[10] Lynne Hamill, ‘Time as a Rare Commodity in Home Life’ in Richard Harper (ed)., Inside the Smart Home (London, 2003), p. 70.
[11] Andre Millard, Beatlemania, Technology, Business and Teen Culture in Cold War America (Maryland, 2012), p. 148.
[12] Ian Inglis, ‘Here There and Everywhere: Introducing The Beatles’ in Ian Inglis (ed)., Popular Music and Television in Britain (Oxon, 2010), p. 194-5.
[13] Peter Gurney “The Battle of the Consumer in Post-war Britain.” The Journal of Modern History 77, no. 4 (2005), pp. 956–87.
[14] Kate Siobhan Mulligan, The Beatles A Musical Biography (California, 2010), p.70.
[15] Sara Cohen, “Country at the Heart of the City: Music, Heritage, and Regeneration in Liverpool.” Ethnomusicology 49, no. 1 (2005), pp. 42.
[20] Elliot J. Huntley, Mystical One: George Harrison After the Break-Up of The Beatles (Toronto, 2004), p. 9.
[21] George Melly, Revolt Into Style (London, 2012), p. 32.
[22] John Muncie, ‘The Beatles and the Spectacle of Youth’ in Ian Inglis (ed)., The Beatles, Popular Music and Society (Hampshire, 2000), p. 42.
[23] Patricia Gallo-Stenman, Diary of a Beatlemaniac: A Fab Insiders Look at the Beatles Era (Philadelphia, 2018), p. 17.
[24] Paul Gleed, ‘The Rest of You, If You’ll Just Rattle Your Jewellery’ in Kenneth Womack and Todd F. Davis (ed)., Reading The Beatles Cultural Studies, Literary Criticism and the Fab Four (New York, 2006), p. 162-3.
[25] Steve Turner, The Gospel According to The Beatles (Louisville, 2006), p. 88-89.
As I spring clean my bedroom, I’m taken aback by the sheer volume of forgotten corners and the memories they hold. Every knickknack, stray sock, and dust bunny is a small chapter in the story of my life. But today, beneath a mountain of clothes that no longer fit or suit my taste, I found something extraordinary: the last pair of PJs my mum bought me.
These pyjamas have been through countless wash cycles, their fabric softened to the point of being threadbare, and their vibrant colours faded into a comfortable pastel. They’ve seen better days and are fit for the bin by all measures. Yet, as I hold them in my hands, it’s as if I’m holding a piece of a time that once was—a time accompanied by my mum’s warm, loving presence.
I find myself folding them up with care, the same way she would have, paying attention to the creases and edges, making them as neat as the first day I received them. And as I tuck them away back in a drawer, it strikes me—grief is weird.
This indefinable emotion doesn’t follow a manual or a linear path. Here I am, cleaning out my room, trying to declutter my life to establish order in the chaos. And yet, I’m holding onto a pair of pyjamas that have outlived their use. But isn’t that just it? Grief isn’t practical; it doesn’t care for utility or minimalism. Grief clings to the fibres of well-worn fabric because they are infused with moments, laughter, and the irreplaceable comfort of a mother’s hug.
It’s peculiar how grief manifests in the objects we once deemed inconsequential. Who knew a pair of pyjamas could anchor a sea of emotions that billows beneath the surface of everyday life? They rekindle moments as soft and fuzzy as the worn cotton against my skin—the Sunday mornings lazily spent in bed, the late-night ice cream raids, the feverish nights as a child when her reassuring touch seemed to be the only cure.
As the seasons change and the years pass, grief evolves with us. It moves from the teary-eyed, acute pangs of loss to the more subdued yet persistent presence in our everyday objects. It can sneak up on you during a mundane task, like spring cleaning, or in the quiet moments when you stumble upon a relic that’s both priceless and painfully ordinary.
Sure, the heart feels the gravitational pull of past affections in such tangible keepsakes. Still, it is also a vessel for carrying legacies forward. In my continuous journey through grief, I understand that it is not simply about preserving what was but about nurturing what is — the lessons, the warmth, and the essence carried forth from those we’ve loved and lost.
And so, in this spring cleaning, I find more than just the opportunity to tidy up spaces and clear out the old. It becomes a ritual of remembrance, a choreography of holding on and letting go. Each item I decide to keep or part with is a conversation with my past, a negotiation with my memories. The decision to keep the pyjamas is an acknowledgement of my mother’s lasting impact, a physical reminder of her, nestled in the fabric of my daily life.
As the day wears on, the light shifts across the room, casting long shadows that seem to carry the weight of nostalgia. I glance around the room, which now feels less cluttered, but notice how each remaining piece tells its own story, and there’s beauty and melancholy in the tales they weave. Perhaps this is what the essence of spring cleaning is about — not just the act of cleaning but the process of cherishing and reflecting upon the patches of our lives that make up the quilt of our existence.
Is it strange, then, that a seemingly insignificant object, like a pair of pyjamas becomes a vessel for such a complex journey through love and loss? I think not. Grief, in all its strangeness, teaches us that everything has value, every moment has depth, and every little thing we touch is imprinted with the essence of our relationships.
In the drawers and closets, between folded linens and hung shirts, the echoes of bygone days linger. The laughter and the tears all inhabit these spaces quietly waiting for moments like today when they can emerge if only briefly, to remind us that they were, that they mattered and that they still do.
I realize now that grief, in its infinite weirdness, is not an enemy to be vanquished but a companion on the journey. It morphs and changes as we do, and like the changing seasons, it can bring both melancholy and growth. It reminds us of our capacity to love profoundly after loss and to find peace in what remains behind us.
In essence, those pyjamas have transcended their physical form. They are no longer just a pair of worn-out fabric—they’re woven into the tapestry of my heart, a soft piece of armour against the sometimes harsh realities of life without her. They’re a covenant, a pledge to remember, feel, and continue cherishing the person who once gifted them with such thought and love.
I can’t help but smile, feeling that, in some way, Mum is still here—in the gentle breeze, in the light that dances across the cleaned surfaces, and in a pair of old pyjamas, forever folded, forever cherished. In the weird and wonderful tapestry of grieving, every thread counts, and every moment is a step towards remembering not just what we’ve lost but also what we’ve loved, and what we must carry forward.
The Welfare Reform Act of 2012 earmarked cuts of £15 billion within the benefits system with the focus of making claiming benefits fair to the taxpayer and claimants (Shildrick, 2013). Announced in October 2010 in a spending review by the coalition government, the Welfare Act of 2012 was fully operational by September 2013. One central aim of the Welfare Act was to put a stop to independent benefits at £26,000 per year or £500 a week for a family of working age. Bedroom tax was introduced to anyone who was renting a property that had a spare bedroom (O’Brien and Kyprianou, 2018). This reduced the rate of housing benefit received for one person by 14% and by 25% for two or more people living in a rented household (GOV.UK, 2018). October 2013 also saw the introduction of Universal Credit and has been gradually implemented into the system since October 2013. Universal Credit replaced six main benefits including Income-based Jobseekers Allowance and Working Tax Credit(GOV.UK, 2018). This would affect the unemployed and those who worked. The reforms in recent years to the benefits system have hit the most deprived areas in Britain the hardest because those living on, or near the poverty line are the people who rely on their benefits the most (Shildrick, 2018).
However, it is not just the change in the benefits system that has hit claimants hard since the introduction of Universal Credit. In August 2017 the Department of Work and Pensions announced that 2.1 million sanctions had been carried out on those claiming Jobseekers Allowance alone. (Shildrick, 2018). Claimants have had benefits withdrawn for simple reasons such as arriving late for an appointment or for not turning up for interviews with advisors. Withholding benefits in this way stop people looking for employment as their focus is mainly on trying to live without their benefits for the length of time the sanctions last. Penalising people in this way causes more problems for those people experiencing poverty. (Shildrick, 2018). In 2016 the UN described the austerity measures as a ‘breach of human rights’ and expressed their concerns about the levels of inequality in the UK. (Shildrick, 2018). Professor David Whyte has described the austerity that has occurred in recent years as a ‘class project’ that ‘targets working-class households’ (Cooper and Whyte, 2017). Instead of the Government supporting those who need help we have seen the opposite happening through policy developments. (Shildrick, 2018). Research carried out by the Fabian Society discovered that targeting people who received benefits was counterproductive and only served to force more people into deprivation (Lansley and Mack, 2017).
As of 1911, Unemployment Benefit was paid to individuals who found themselves without a salary and regardless of the overall income that was brought into each household. Now benefit claimants seeking work have to justify the benefits they receive by proving that they are actively seeking employment. If a claimant fails to honour this, it will result in disciplinary action (Jones and Novak, 1999). Sanctions such as cutting benefits by two weeks for not seeking employment, rising to four weeks if repeated can only be seen as punishing vulnerable people who do not have the skills to lift themselves out of the circumstances that they find themselves in (Parliament, 2018). For those claimants with children or disabilities that have been placed under sanctions, a hardship payment can be obtained but only if a claimant can demonstrate that they are suffering financial problems (Cpag.org.uk, 2018). The number of people placed under sanctions by September 2013 was 897,690 with the number one reason being the failure to attend interviews (O’Brien and Kyprianou, 2018). With trust between advisors and claimants at a low, those on benefits find that they are subjected to more vulnerability and pressure from a system that offers little support to protect a claimant from poverty (Shildrick, 2013).
The government suggests that finding employment is a simple way of avoiding the poverty trap. Research by Oxfam has found that more people were working and staying in poverty than those who remained unemployed. Since 2005 there has been a doubling of households claiming housing benefit (Shildrick, 2013). As of 2012 4.9 million people in employment were classed as the ‘working poor’, receiving a salary that didn’t sustain a satisfactory amount of money to live on (Joseph Rowntree, 2018). Those classed as the ‘working poor’ live close to the poverty line and rely on benefits such as child tax credits and working tax credits to supplement their earning to avoid falling deeper into poverty (Shildrick, 2013). However, Working Tax Credit has been blamed for allowing employers for not offering a higher wage with £11 billion pounds of taxpayers money a year used to subsidise salaries of the low paid (Meadway, 2018). Not everyone can claim Working Tax Credits with the limit of working 16 hours for some claimants (Royston, 2017). This leaves many people unable to apply for assistance. Many claimants are confused by the system that has struggled with unreliability and one that has gone through repeated change (Shildrick, 2013). According to the head of health and welfare at the Institute of economic affairs Dr Kristian Niemietz, too many households within the UK are exchanging one type of poverty for another when they become employed, and in that respect, the guarantee of employment does not secure financial stability (Niemietz, 2011). It is these problems within the system that stop people from claiming what they are entitled to (Shildrick, 2013).
However, it is not only the system that stops people from claiming what they are entitled. There has been an attack on people who are receiving welfare benefits in recent years all fuelled by politicians, journalists and the taxpayer who criticise claimants who they feel take from society without giving anything back (Seabrook, 2015). During the 1980s due to high taxes and the overhaul of the free market it was the perfect opportunity for the media to address the issue of those in society who were healthy but unemployed. Labelling people as ‘shirkers’ who abuse the system at the expense of the working taxpayer (Seabrook, 2015). Daily Mail columnist Lynda Lee-Porter was particularly critical of the ‘healthy unemployed’ suggesting that there is a need to support those who need help, but the public only become ‘resentful when we see it going to the able-bodied parasite malingers’ (Grover, 2008). However, the media blaming the public because they are unemployed eliminates blame from the government who should be held to account (Jones and Novak, 1999).
Margaret Thatcher assumed that people couldn’t budget their monthly earnings so that in turn led to poverty. This narrative has been ingrained into people’s minds when it comes to reinforcing the idea that people who are claiming benefits have a reluctance to work (Shildrick, 2018). Statements like this suggest the system discriminates against people who work and present those living in poverty as to blame for their problems. The system itself is not blamed for causing hardship, but those that are reliant on welfare benefits are depicted as scroungers and are workshy (Shildrick, 2018). Views from our politicians can have a lasting effect on how the general public view those who are welfare dependent. Negative stories about claimants in the media led to David Cameron recommending that Britain and the welfare state needed to be fixed (Byrne, Foster and Kerr, 2018).Statements like this strengthen the idea that people who are claiming benefits are to blame for a failed system. But it is not just politicians who portray those who are dependent on welfare benefits in a negative light. Programmes such as ‘Benefits Street’ and ‘The Jeremy Kyle Show’ have shown the people on their shows as lazy, good for nothing scroungers who do nothing all day but take drugs and drink alcohol. Programmes like this prey on the most vulnerable in our society and humiliate those who need help and support (Shildrick, 2018). Although programmes such as ‘Benefits Street’ do bring about the debate surrounding poverty and the ‘underserving poor’ (Longhurst et al., 2017). The print media, however, have their agendas and produce sensational headlines that suggest that claimants are receiving benefits for doing nothing at all. Articles like this do not show the real causes of poverty that lie within the system and through a lack of training opportunities (Shildrick, 2018). The media’s twisting of the truth helps to influence the public’s opinion on benefit claimants (O’Hara, 2015).
According to fullfact.org, the number of uses food banks had increased from 41,000 in 2010 to 1.2 million in 2018. This doesn’t consider individuals using food banks as people can visit foodbanks repeatedly (Full Fact, 2018). Research by Child Poverty Action Group discovered that a family of four with two working parents needed an additional £76 a week to stay above the poverty line (Cpag.org.uk, 2018). In recent years it would appear due to cuts, that the welfare state no longer helps those in need. Where support in the form of money from the government has fallen in recent years the facilities available for children in the form of free prescriptions for children and free school meals provided for infant school children helps to reduce child poverty in a small way (Shaw et al., 2000). It is, however, charities who have provided support to families when the government have fallen short.
It is not only benefit payments that have been cut since 2012 with support within communities such as women refuge centres and career services for young adults have been phased out. As many as 1000 Sure Start centres have closed since 2009. Protecting vulnerable youths in society has stopped with the closure of youth mental health services meaning that schools are put under strain as they try to support vulnerable pupils. People have then, in turn, reached out to charities for support (Lansley and Mack, 2017). Charities have become an essential part of society as people deal with austerity in their communities (Cohen, Fuhr and Bock, 2017). For instance, the Trussell Trust offer support for those people living in poverty and provide help in the way of food bank assistance (Lambie-Mumford, 2017). With the loss of youth clubs and the closing down of day centres for the elderly, charities are understandably oversubscribed as the government turn their backs on the poor.
It is vital that the welfare state can distinguish between those who deserve help and those that do not. From the evidence provided here, it has shown that there is a lack of support for individuals and families who are ‘in work’ poverty and who are struggling with eligibility for tax credits for instance. The welfare system fails to recognise the struggle people have in trying to escape the poverty trap. The benefit reforms that were introduced in 2012 have hit the most vulnerable in society the hardest and have led to charities replacing the support of the government. It is clear that if a government cannot distinguish between the undeserving to the deserving poor, then society becomes fragmented with the media placing blame on the needy for the failings of a government. If there is no legitimacy within the system, then those who require help will fall further into deprivation resulting in further issues for the wider society. The welfare state does not try to distinguish between those that deserve help and those who do not. This is because the system is flawed and does not consider the personal circumstances of each case which leads to individuals and families being unable to free themselves of poverty without much support from the government.
Bibliography
Byrne, C., Foster, E. and Kerr, P. (2018). Understanding Conservative Modernisation. In: T. Heppell and D. Seawright, ed., Cameron and the Conservatives: The Transition to Coalition Government. Palgrave Macmillan, p.25.
Cohen, S., Fuhr, C. and Bock, J. (2017). Austerity, community action, and the future of citizenship in Europe. Policy Press, p.179.
Cooper, V. and Whyte, D. (2017). The violence of austerity. Pluto Press, p.11.
Grief is a funny thing. One minute you can be happy doing your own thing, and the next, you are crying because the batteries popped out of the remote control without warning, and you cannot power up the television without it. Pathetic? Probably. But that is grief; it lays bare your most sensitive side and brings out your insecurities. It makes you believe without a doubt that the minor things that usually have no relevance to our everyday experiences could be world ending without any recovery as we slide deeper and deeper into the pits of despair.
This is what happened to me in May 2021 when my mum died from Ovarian Cancer. My family knew mum would die soon, but it was not something that I could personally tell people. ‘Oh hi, yeah, I’m good, thanks, oh, did you know that my mum is dying’. I mean, talk about a conversation killer. I did not want to be that friend who wallowed in her misery, and I stupidly thought I could continue as usual even though a significant part of my world would soon leave us. But I guess too that I tried to shelter the people who were around me because it was clear they were hoping for a good outcome and looking to me to offer them anything that could be seen as ‘good news’ because then it would make them feel comfortable when I was in their company.
Grief can ruin friendships, especially with people who have never experienced the loss of someone close. How can a person possibly understand the stages of suffering you are going through and the tangled mess that grief weaves on this spinning wheel called life? Friends would say they were there for me or call, text, and visit if I needed anything. That is okay in the early days when getting out of bed feels like climbing Mount Everest or when you have no energy to cook, and suddenly the Terry’s Chocolate Orange that you’ve been hoarding since Christmas looks like it could work as a main meal – well it is fruit.
Grief within friendships has an expiry date. I do not blame people for that; it is simply down to societal norms that you should be over trauma in a set length of time. A week? Yeah, a week is a perfect rationale for recovering from losing a parent you were close to for forty plus years. There is no time limit; there is no recovering from the loss in a quick time because society expects you to. So how do we deal with these expectations? We quietly suffer in silence, hoping that our grief lessens to an acceptable level that allows us to integrate back into society without needing to mention our loss. We can act as if nothing has happened because, once again, society demands that of us. We can grieve but on in a way that is expected by the societal expectations that we live by.
Continuing as normal is also something that many of us do after a loss because nobody comes to save us. There are societal norms expected from friends to socialise, make yourself available, visit people and act as if you are okay. Let me be brutally honest, none of this is normal. You’re just living to please others, and when you realise that you are mostly on your own with your grief, it is liberating to free yourself from the shackles of the responsibilities that society expects from you.
But when you free yourself from the restraints of these friendships, you no longer have to cope with the insensitivities surrounding your grief. You do not have to listen to the narrative that you should be over your loss but when arguments between families spill out, and your friends ask for support you realise that life is too short for disagreeing over basically nothing. Especially when I would give anything to have just one more conversation with mum, which was denied to me in the last weeks of her life because she was too weak even to speak.
The best approach is to walk away from other people’s drama to protect your mental health. You cannot change how people behave; just let them be. But what does make me laugh is that people talk quite openly about being kind and supporting people who are struggling for whatever reason, but when push comes to shove, it’s only said to make people look good. We are told we should be open about our mental health, yet that narrative is largely shut down when we try to be open and honest. The same can be said about miscarriage. It is such a taboo subject that when it happens, nobody knows what to say; they would instead mumble something about being there if you need anything. But how is that ever helpful? It passes the buck onto the grieving person, and you are told if you do not ask for support, ‘well, you never asked’. But how supportive would a person be if a grieving person reached out for that support?
The only people who genuinely know what you are going through are those who have been through it themselves, and their support has been invaluable to me. But it is like we belong to an awful club that nobody wants to be a part of. Yet, we have collective grief; we understand how it feels to lose somebody who has always been there. My mum passed away a year ago today; the past year has been an eye-opener for how people treat you when you are going through a loss. The friends and family that I expected to be there did not step up, but that’s not to say that I have not had support from people I have grown to love and respect for how amazing they have been to me in this past year. I feel grief changes your friendship circle. People come and go throughout our lives, but it takes a considerable loss to re-evaluate those friendships. Although a mum-shaped hole is missing from my life, I now feel I can move forward and enjoy life like she would have wanted rather than be in a constant state of despair over losing her sooner than we all would have expected. Recovering from a loss takes time; if you are going through it, do not let anyone tell you that you are being unreasonable in your distress. Remember, some people will give you space to get through it and keep supporting you. Hang on to those people; they are the friends we all need.
This dissertation seeks to explore women’s experience of the American Revolutionary War. Linda K. Kerber describes the American Revolutionary War as ‘a strongly politicizing experience, but the newly created republic made little room for them as political beings.’[1] The belief at the time supported the idea that women did not have the mental capacity to escape from their domestic lives and support the war effort. Yet, the American Revolutionary War allowed women to actively free themselves from their daily responsibilities as wives and mothers to assist the war effort.[2] That is not to say that the help that women provided was accepted by society within the colonies. The demands placed on women challenged the attitudes and cultural perspectives upon which women were seen as the inferior sex.[3]
LITERATURE
Within the historiography, debates of women’s role in the American Revolutionary War have been largely examined. Still, there has been little scope for evaluating how people responded to these roles within the colonies. Primary investigations into women during the Revolutionary War can be found in Linda K. Kerber’s Women of the Republic Intellect andIdeology in Revolutionary America and focuses on female involvement during the shaping of the new nation. Coupled with Liberty’s Daughters: The Revolutionary Experience ofAmerican Women by Mary Beth Norton shows that both have provided valuable examinations of women’s sphere in the American colonies. Women of the Republic has a traditional approach with discussions on political theory and the failure of women to receive suffrage in post-revolutionary America. Yet, despite this, Kerber successfully demonstrated how important women were to the Revolutionary War effort. Norton, however, focuses her discussions on the domestic sphere and women’s roles within the family home. Both historians reveal that women did play important roles within the Revolutionary War. The dilemmas that women faced can be seen in the discussion surrounding writer Mary Otis Warren who, according to Rosemarie Zagarri’s A Woman’s Dilemma: Mercy Otis Womenand the American Revolution, was reliant on her husband, father, and friend John Adams to approve her writing rather than form her ideas based upon her gender. In Carol Berkin’s Revolutionary Mothers, the topics discussed involve civic action from the women in the colonies and the role of women as camp followers, demonstrating the complexities involved in the female narratives of the time. Such complexities can be found in Marilyn S. Blackwell’s article ‘The Republican Vision of Mary Palmer Tyler’, in which Blackwell brings forth new arguments surrounding Republican Motherhood. Similarly, Barbara Clark Smith argues in her book The Freedoms We Lost that the American Revolution brought about rights for some colonists but took away the old-style politics of the colonial period. However, the book’s title is misleading, and Smith makes generalisations in debating that new laws and the disputes between the morals of a community and self- reliance waned upon the end of the Revolution. This idea goes against the historiography that proves that the debates continued long after the American Revolutionary War. The secondary sources provided here have been instrumental in supporting the argument that the American Revolutionary War was not revolutionary enough for women who had been active in supporting the war effort.
METHODOLOGY
To determine the impact of the American Revolutionary War on women within the colonies, this dissertation applies a micro-historical perspective to investigate the histories of women who lived through the Revolutionary War. This approach offers an independent interpretation and stops the research from being overly reliant on broad assumptions about the experience of colonial woman. The micro-historical method provides a more individual standpoint, which is essential to understanding the close association of the experience the women had. The evidence provided in exploring the colonial woman’s private experience is obtained from letters, poetry, and broadside articles. The sources were chosen to show the women’s abilities to assist the war effort and offer the connection between how the women dealt with the ongoing war in the colonies. However, such sources are limited in their approach and can be seen as overly emotional and unreliable. Yet, it was essential to use such sources to show women’s experience and how they told their stories.
STRUCTURE
To investigate women’s roles within the American Revolutionary War and the attitudes towards the female sphere, this dissertation will use a three-chapter structure to scrutinise each area of research in-depth. The first chapter will investigate female writers Phillis Wheatley and Mercy Otis Warren, who were present during the Revolutionary War. The chapter will focus on their opinions during the war effort and the influence of individuals they befriended. Chapter two explores the lack of political theory available to women living in the colonies, the ideological belief in Republican Motherhood and how despite women being allowed to teach their sons, it was only authorised so boys could be raised as leaders. Finally, the third chapter explores women’s mobilisation to fundraise for the soldiers, women who would become camp followers joining the army on the battlefields and how this mobilisation was received by society at the time. Within this chapter women who concealed their gender to fight alongside the men will also be discussed. As a collective, the three chapters explain that the American Revolutionary War did not bring about liberties for the women who supported the war effort.
CHAPTER ONE – FEMALE WRITERS
Life within the thirteen colonies for women brought about change throughout the Revolutionary War. Many men confined women to the domestic sphere and believed that they could not mobilize themselves to support the war effort.[4] The dissociation between male and female spheres was influenced by the idea that men and women perform contrasting roles in society due to their genetics and biological composition.[5] This idea of this biological determinism began during the Age of Enlightenment when philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau stated that because females were different from males, they should focus their efforts on reproduction and domestic duties.[6] One such female who will be discussed here is Phillis Wheatley, who arrived in the Colonies from Africa to live as a slave. Undeterred by her situation Wheatley rose above the constraints of slavery to become the first black women to have poetry published within the colonies.[7] Another writer who will be examined in this chapter is Mercy Otis Warren, who wrote anti-British plays in the colonies.[8] Warren’s was also influenced by other males around her, including her husband and father as well as John Adams, the second President of the United States. In this chapter, debate will be given to the theory that despite Warren’s ability to write and debate with leading political figures, Warren was still limited by the female sphere and what was expected of her as a woman living in the colonies.
It is difficult to pinpoint when and where Wheatley was born, but the records suggest that her date of birth can be identified as approximately 1753 in Africa’s Senegal area. Her new owners were Susanna and John Wheatley, the latter being employed within the tailoring business. P. Wheatley’s role within the Wheatley’s home was as a domestic servant, but what was quite unusual for Wheatley was that the Wheatley’s educated her.[9] According to Norton, for many black people at the time, this was quite remarkable as black children were illiterate for the most part.[10] According to Mr Wheatley within sixteen months Wheatley ’attained the English Language to such a Degree as to read any, the most difficult Part of the Sacred Writings, to the great astonishment of all who heard her’.[11] Because white people taught Wheatley while she was enslaved, Smith believes that this caused Wheatley to feel undeserving of the advantages she had over other black people.[12] In one respect, Wheatley was fortunate that her owners were so willing to educate her. But at the same time, the Wheatley’s were able to shape P. Wheatley into someone who thought the same way as they did.
Wheatley’s writing had been criticised in the past by historians because she refused to condemn slavery. However, in 1776 a collection of her poetry was published where Wheatley wrote that Africans were similar to Europeans, so were God’s children and should be held in higher esteem than they were.[13] In one of Wheatley’s last poems’ ‘On the Death of General Wooster,’ written in July 1778, Wheatley wrote in the second person as Wooster to discuss the issues surrounding slavery and the hypocrisy of those who fought for American liberty. Wheatley believed that independence in the new nation would not be achievable for everyone. She wrote, ‘But how presumptuous shall we hope to find Divine acceptance with th’ Almighty mind…And hold in bondage Africa’s blameless race? Be victory ours and generous freedom theirs.’[14] Wheatley never wrote about her experience with slavery or as a black woman living in the colonies. As Smith points out, Wheatley may have seen herself as having a white mind because of her ethnicity and the education given to her by her owners.[15]
Portrait of Phillis Wheatley. Date 1773.
However, according to Sondra O Neale, there is evidence to suggest that Wheatley’s rejection of the discussion surrounding her own experience of slavey is because she believed that slavery was predestined.[16] While Professor Carla L. Peterson explores the theory that Wheatley was voiceless on her own experiences surrounding slavery to safeguard herself.[17] By speaking out about her own experiences surrounding slavery, Wheatley may have been silenced by those around her because she was a minority voice. However, there is evidence that Wheatley did involve herself in Revolutionary dialogue. In 1776 she wrote and sent George Washington a congratulatory poem that resulted in Wheatley visiting the General’s home. In the poem, she made it obvious he had her support stating within the poem that ‘Proceed, great chief, with virtue on thy side, Thy ev’ry action let the goddess guide. A crown, a mansion, and a throne that shine, With gold unfading. Washington! Be thine’.[18] From this, we can see that Wheatley supported the revolution’s principles despite writing in 1778 the poem ‘On the Death of General Wooster’ and the hypocrisy of those who fought in the Revolutionary War. Wheatley was now complicit in that hypocrisy herself.[19] It was impossible for a black woman who had freed herself from her owners to speak out against slavery. Wheatley was much more subtle in her condemnation of slavery by including anti-slavery rhetoric in her work. However, she was still shackled by her owner’s opinions, and because of her upbringing, she would not utilise her voice in condemning slavery to the fullest.
There was the opportunity for Wheatley to become involved with debating the emancipation of slaves in the colonies. Massachusetts, for instance, allowed some slaves their liberty if they enlisted in their regiment. Although not everyone was this fortunate and some slaves, through their despair, joined the British cause who promised freedom upon victory. John Murray, Earl of Dunmore, and royalist governor of Virginia offered mandatory freedom for any black man who joined his ‘Ethiopian Regiment’, yet this did not come to fruition. While slaves are suffering and dying in the colonies, Wheatley remained silent and not persuaded to speak on their behalf.[20] Brawley claims that her absence to debate race awareness is because she had no alternative in shaping her writing on those that she was acquainted with, so she had no point of reference to discuss matters surrounding race.[21] Yet Professor Vincent Carretta argues that while Wheatley may not attack slavery, she does not avoid the topic. In a letter to her friend Samuel Occom, she states that ‘God had implanted a Principle, which we call Love of Freedom; it is impatient of Oppression, and pants for Deliverance…’ Carretta focuses on Wheatley references to Christianity and the use of religion to show the double standards of Christians who had enslaved black people.[22] Although Wheatley did not ridicule slavery, she was more subtle than that in voicing her concerns. She was shackled by her race and her educational upbringing by her white slave owners, so she could not give the voiceless a voice.
Poet, playwright, and pamphleteer Mercy Otis Warren relied heavily on the male sphere to validate her writing. For instance, she befriended John Adams, who said that he ‘knew of no poetic genius like Warren.[23] Warren wrote anti-British plays that would be read aloud and published in newspapers, although she did so anonymously.[24] If she put her name to her work, it would become her thoughts and opinions, and this was frowned upon in the male sphere of political thinking.[25] Hutcheson believes that Adams was using Warren’s writing to spread propaganda in the colonies to further the patriot cause. From the standpoint of those she was writing for, it is unsurprising that Warren’s radical approach brought about a revolutionary portrayal that encouraged people to side with the patriots. A satire written by Warren entitled ‘The Group’ and published in 1778 by both the Boston Gazette and Massachusetts Spy, also troubled Warren.[26] The play concentrated on the corruption and the selfish behaviours of some Tories.[27] The British government published propaganda via speeches, newspapers, and pamphlets that, according to the patriots, all gave support to the royal governor Thomas Hutchinson. To Warren, it was her role to discredit these narratives through her work.[28] Because of the subject matter, Warren was worried about publication and requested Adams’s opinions regarding ridiculing someone openly and how this may not be seen as good Christian practice.[29] In a letter dated 30 January 1775, Warren asked Adams, ‘If she indulges her pen to paint in the darkest shades, even those whose Vice and Venality have rendered contemptible’.[30] Adam’s reply on 15 March 1775 points to Warren use of parody and wrote back to Warren by stating that ‘I know of none, ancient or modern which have reached the tender, the pathetic, the keen and severe, and at the same time, the Soft, the Sweet, the amiable and the pure in greater Perfection’.[31] Adams realised that Warren could use her voice to reach out to the female sphere to support the war effort. But her letter writing to Adams made it possible for Warren to gain a voice in the revolutionary period. Warren’s ability to publish would not be available to her without Adams’ influence because Adams was dictating the friendship and instructing Warren on her writing to further the patriot cause. The desire to seek validation from the male sphere made her appear weak-minded and unsure of her work unless males approved it.
Portrait of Mercy Otis Warren. Date 1768.
Zagarri asserts that Warren was also heavily influenced by her father, James Otis Sr. and her husband, James Warren, who urged her to publish her poems. If her husband or father were not supportive of her political writing, Warren would be going against men’s authority within her family. However, her concerns and the reasons she looked for men’s approval around her was because she was fearful that she may be entering into the male sphere and had no right to do so. Despite her writing ability, Warren still saw her primary role in life as a wife and mother, so her fears came from the idea that society during the Revolutionary War expected her to fulfil those roles within the woman’s sphere.[32] In a letter to Mrs Adams, Warren wrote that she did believe that women were ‘confined to the narrow circle of domestic cares’. Warren was envious of those women who remained unmarried, thinking that they were ‘free from those constant interruptions that necessarily occupy the mind of the wife, the mother and the mistress’. She was critical of certain women who ‘swim off the surface of pleasure’. But she also felt sadness for those women who were ‘wholly immersed’ in domesticity and ‘had no higher ideas than those which confine her to the narrow circle of domestic attention’[33] This shows that Warren did want to strike a balance between her domestic world and the world of politics. Warren confessed that her reasoning for entering the political realm was done to stop her boredom and were simply spur-of-the-moment musings. She described her writing as being ‘written as the amusement of solitude, at a period when every active member of society was engaged, either in the field or the cabinet, to resist the strong hand of foreign domination’.[34] Warren knew her limitations as a writer believing that women belonged, as Rousseau claimed, to the private domain of home life and domesticity. Because as a woman, Warren could, of course, discuss politics within the privacy of her home environment, but if a woman were to write publicly about political issues, she would be seen as entering the male sphere, and that was something that was frowned upon in the colonies. Yet, men did not want women to enter the political realm despite her husband affirming that Warren could write politically, and this was her ‘masculine genius’.[35]
Before the Revolutionary War had begun, women were criticized for their intellectual weaknesses, Berkin in her book Revolutionary Mothers writes that the war had allowed women to think logically and make moral decisions.[36] Zagarri describes Warren as a woman contributing to the political realm but cannot be seen as a feminist.[37] However, Warren did contravene the usual role of women by writing about the politic situation. Although, this was only achievable because the men around her allowed her to do so. Nancy Rubin Stuart praises Warren for writing her opinions on the Revolutionary War when politically it was difficult for a woman to be heard.[38] Through her writing, Edmund M. Hayes believes that Warren helped the people of Massachusetts understand the dangers that the British held regarding their rights and freedoms. She informed the public of the threat posed by Hutchinson in such a way that appealed to their intelligence. By doing so, she helped organise a larger audience of resistance to the British’s oppression felt in the colonies.[39] Despite her misgivings of wondering if she should have a voice within the male sphere of the political world, she strengthened the post-war debate that women could become political actors in debating politics publicly proving that philosophers such as Rousseau were wrong in their assumptions that women belonged solely to the female sphere of reproduction and domesticity.
To conclude, the life of Wheatley was quite unusual, given her status as a slave. The education given to her by the Wheatley’s allowed her owners to influence Wheatley thinking. From this education, we can understand why Wheatley did not write about her experiences of slavery. There was also the issue of Wheatley having a unique position as a black free slave. If she were to speak out about slavery, then her discussion would be lost within the many pro-slavery voices within the male sphere who relied on slavery for their businesses. Warren too was another writer who was influenced by those around her. Writing anonymously gave her the ability to have a voice without explaining her thoughts as a woman. During the Revolutionary War and their correspondence, her friendship with Adams shows that Warren sought validation for her writing from a man making Warren appear unsure or weak in her approach. The likes of Adams and the males around her, such as Warren’s husband and brother, were happy for Warren to contribute to the patriot cause’s efforts through her writing, but that is where her involvement should end. Warren, too, understood that society would primarily see her as a wife and mother, yet she was torn in her role of wanting to write and be free, but she also knew that she was restricted by the women’s sphere and what was expected of her. Yet Warren’s work is useful to the debates surrounding women as political actors after the American Revolutionary War, even if she could not write freely during her lifetime. Both Wheatley and Warren contributed positively to the history of the forming of the new nation in America. Yet, as shown in this chapter, both women were unable to write freely and were shackled by their ethnicity and femininity by men and the class structures that dominated their lives.
CHAPTER TWO – POLITICAL THEORY AND REPUBLICAN MOTHERHOOD
Within the American colonies, there was a lack of political theory for women regarding the role that females could play in the political realm.[40] With the Revolutionary War, ideas were coming to the fore that some women were becoming vocal about what role they should play in Revolutionary America.[41] In order to explain and understand how women were confined to their gender in the American colonies this chapter will discuss women such as Abigail Adams, who did not want suffrage for women but did want women not to be forgotten in the new constitution’s laws. Mrs Adams wanted women to gain some liberties.[42] Despite the debates surrounding women at least obtaining some legal standing, women were still constrained by the male sphere. The colonists were looking to political theorist John Locke for guidance on women’s rights in the political realm. However, Locke’s writing did not go far enough in liberating women.[43] Surrounding Lockean theory was the notion of Republican Motherhood based on the justification of educating women because they may one day have sons.[44] Support for Republican Motherhood can be seen from the Scottish philosophers in understanding that women played a vital role in passing on their family values to their sons.[45] Yet, despite this newfound role for women, they were still hindered by the domestic sphere.
Within American Political theory, man’s rights were based on autonomy and independence; for males, this brought about options such as being involved in building the new nation and debating the issues surrounding the Revolutionary War. For women, any entitlement that they had stemmed from their usefulness within the domestic sphere.[46] However, women were finding it increasingly difficult to remain quiet on the subject of politics.[47] Quaker Ann Emlen addressed this concern in her journal On Politicks by asking, ‘How shall I impose a silence upon myself when the subject is so very interesting, so much engrossing Conversation – and what every Member of the Community is more or less concerned in?’ Some women seemed to lack confidence to enter the political realm. Elizabeth Feilde wrote in 1776 that politics is ‘a subject for which I have not either Talents or Inclination to enter upon’.[48] Yet as time progressed, women could enter political debates as men slowly began to accept female discussions within the private domain. This change can be seen in Samuel Adams’ letter to his wife, Betsy, that included a political narrative. In another letter, Adams claimed that ‘it had not been usual for me to write to you of War or Politick’. However, by 1781 his opinions on women had changed again by stating, ‘I see no reason why a Man may not communicate his political opinions to his wife if he pleases’.[49] Such a change in opinion may have happened because women read literature on the Revolutionary War and informed their husbands or male relatives away from home what was happening politically in the wider world.[50] However, women engaging privately is different from women debating politics within the public sphere.
During the Revolutionary War discussions began into the notion that equality could also be given to women. Evidence of this can be found in private letters written by Abigail Adams, who was the wife of the second President of the United States, John Adams. Mrs Adams explored the definition of citizenship in the female sphere and took exception to women being prohibited from entering the political realm. Yet despite their private correspondence, women did not create a forum for discussing their rights and did nothing to alter their circumstances in entering politics.[51] Mrs Adams maintained that women were best suited to conveying their thoughts on politics through private letters instead of public discussions.[52] In a letter to Adams dated March 31, 1776, she asked her husband to ‘Remember the Ladies’ as new legislation was established for the United States of America. Mrs Adams wrote to her husband: ‘in the new code of laws…I desire that you would Remember the Ladies and be more generous and favourable to them than your ancestors. Do not put such unlimited power into the hands of the Husbands. Remember, all Men would be tyrants if they could’.[53] Mrs Adams was not asking for Adams to grant women the right to vote but rather to offer women a change in the legislation that denied married women any legality. The rights of women at the time were extremely limited and put women alongside children with regards to what rights they had.[54] However, in Adams’ response on April 14, 1776 he was less than willing to include women in the legislation so they could gain some independence and responded that ‘we know better than to repeal our Masculine systems’. If any legislation included some liberty for women, then men would feel ‘completely subjected to the Despotism of the Petticoat’.[55] Married women were totally dependent upon their husbands with the law of coverture being place upon them. Coverture was based on the idea that a family was in a better position if the male head of the household was in control of all assets. Married women could no longer own property and any money that a woman earned belonged to her husband to do with as he wished.[56] Adams also described women as a ‘tribe, more numerous and powerful than all the rest.’[57] Adams continual support for the patriarchy is built on the idea of disorder. Using the word ‘tribe,’ it is evident that Adams sees women as inferior to men and inadequate, so they need to be gentle in their manner for society to progress sensibly. People within the colonies who debated if women should be allowed a political voice were also concerned that women should engage with members of their sex rather than a political forum of equal standing for both men and women to debate.[58]
Portrait of Abagail Adams. Date 1766.
Mrs Adams would rather see women debate through reasoning and discussion than taking part in the writing of the constitution. To Mrs Adams, women should care about the nation that the colonists were building and did not want women’s suffrage to be part of the debate.[59] However, in response to Adams’ rejection of women having at least some rights Mrs Adams wrote ‘If particular care and attention is not paid to the Ladies, we are determined to foment a rebellion, and will not hold ourselves bound by any Laws in which we have no voice, or Representation’.[60] Mrs Adams is clearly communicating the argument that women did not have a sufficient legal status and attempting to show what can happen if women are forgotten in the new code of laws.[61] Adams, though, is of the understanding that society would be weakened if women entered the political realm. The letters from Mrs Adams at the time were seen as revolutionary. Those who did not enter political debates were seen as either uninterested or traditional in their thinking.[62] Women were restricted by limitations within the colonies and realised that men would not see women as equals. It was becoming more acceptable for women to have private debates on politics in the domestic sphere. However, it was still difficult for females to obtain full legal representation and have options that would free them from patriarchal control.
As the colonists discussed the ‘rights of man’, a debate on the ‘rights of woman’ also took place. The discussion on women’s rights was not carried out formally and was not overly sympathetic towards women obtaining a political voice. For women to gain a political understanding, they sought their knowledge through magazines and journals aimed at women that gave an insight into the political realm that was usually occupied by men. The new ideas of women’s rights drew on Jock Locke’s social contract theory of natural rights and quality in a state of nature. Locke’s theory brought about the idea of men being identical in a state of nature who come together of one’s own free will to form a social contract. Under this consensus, they surrender some individual liberties to receive security from the government in life, liberty, and property. If the government breached this agreement, then those who consented to it could change the contract. The notion of accepting this agreement suggested that the recipients should carry out their obligations to receive government protection. However, to the colonists, this was interpreted as underestimating their duties and emphasising their self-directing freedoms and personal choices.[63] Yet society rejected the notion that a husband may be dictatorial, especially if a man saw his life within the private domain as honourable and legal. If women did feel dominated, then in most states, divorce was out of the question. Natural rights did not consider women’s permission or options that she may desire in her life.[64] Women in the colonies were still very much controlled by the patriarchal structures. Despite the Revolutionary war freeing the colonies from the British Empire, the liberties achieved here did not offer women emancipation. This is evident that the Revolutionary War was not revolutionary enough for the women who helped build the new nation.
Portrait of John Locke. Date 1697.
Republican Motherhood was based around the ideas of Lockean theory. Locke recommended that women should educate their sons to become the next generation of leaders.[65] Republican Motherhood is built on the idea that women need to be educated because they may become mothers to boys. Any future sons needed to be educated about Republican Ideology.[66] Educating your sons was seen as a women’s civic duty, yet it was only something that would impact ladies of leisure and those of white middle and upper class. This was because women of a higher social standing were seen as brighter than women who were living in poverty. Republican Motherhood did give some women access to education and an active role in the new republic.[67] However, Republican Motherhood restricted the female domain. By placing emphasis on the role of mothers in educating the next generation of male leaders pressure was placed on women to accept this responsibility fearing that it was too significant to refuse. By subjecting women to this narrow circle of educating their sons the opportunity was lost for women to develop their legal positioning and enter the political realm.[68] Yet Republican Motherhood combined political worth into the domestic sphere because it was the mother and not the wider society who became the guardian of the future generation’s virtue.[69] As well as Locke the new ideas about Revolutionary Motherhood came from Scottish philosophers such as Adam Smith, David Hume, and Henry Home with the idea that women in history and society played an important role. Such theories considered that the nuclear family was the main way to pass on traditions, family values and virtuousness. To the Scottish philosophers’ women were the inheritors of social advancement and that women helped to alleviate men’s ruthless preconceptions. Smith described women as ‘humanity’ being ‘the virtue of a woman, generosity of a man. The fair sex, who have commonly much more tenderness than ours, have seldom so much generosity.[70] What the Scottish philosophers discovered was that the obstacles between the public and private realms could be broken down through a civic role. Although this still excluded women from the political realm.[71] Republican Motherhood is also based on the notion that political teachings occur within the family environment, with such education influencing society over time. In this respect, Republican motherhood can be seen as a radical movement because it changed the female sphere and brought women into a role that would influence future leaders of the new American nation.[72] However women teaching their sons now brought about discussion in the advantages of female education even if Republican motherhood brought no political benefits to women.[73] Women becoming educated to teach their sons is not achieving liberation for women but constricts women to the domestic sphere and stops women from empowering themselves with education for their own needs.
The Scottish philosophers believed that if women were to be the confidant of men, they should be educated so females would be appealing to a man rather than educate themselves for their own needs. Hume, for example, wanted women to learn history but only to advance her demeanour for the pleasure of men. Yet, Home believed that not all women needed to be educated; those who lived under monarchies and spent time conversing with men at functions should be taught, which was done to show politeness in high society. However, Home believed that literate women were greater role models and suggested that if mothers were educated, they would no longer be uninformed and uncultured. To Home, there was no need to educate women in the colonies because men were too absorbed in politics to need women’s pleasure.[74] To women, they were designed to assist men. Women in the colonies were to submit to man, be restraint in their manner, and, above all, take care of their offspring. Throughout the colonies, women were told that their roles were to obey man.[75] Despite this slight shift in the role of a woman as a Republican Mother, women were still limited by the colonies’ patriarchal structures.[76]
In conclusion, women had no political representation in the colonies. However, because of the Revolutionary War that was taking place at the time, some women slowly began to find their voice, with some women participating in political dialogue within the private realm. During this time, debates began on women being treated equally as man. With letters from Abigail Adams, this chapter shows that she was quite restrictive in what she was asking for and only asked for women to gain legal representation if needed. Yet her husband was opposed to women having any equality that would allow women to have a political voice. Adams was also unwilling to allow women to have any legal rights in anyway. In understanding the rights of women, the colonists looked to Lockean theory. This concept did not go far enough in freeing women from marriage if she so wished and kept women tied to the patriarchy. What did emerge from Lockean theory was the idea of Republican Motherhood and the need to educate women because they may become mothers of sons one day. This role was seen as too important for women to refuse even though Republican Motherhood appeared restrictive. Scottish philosophers believed that Republican Motherhood would benefit future generations of men because family values are passed down from mothers. However, even though some women had a role to play in the American nation, it was still very restrictive and based around the patriarchy’s hierarchical structures.
CHAPTER THREE- WOMEN’S MOBILISATION
Despite women being excluded in the colonies from the political realm, some females wanted to be proactive to aid the Revolutionary War effort. This chapter will examine the Ladies of Philadelphia Association, who, with Esther de Berdt Reed at the helm, helped fundraise for the Continental Army soldiers. Despite such efforts, Reed angered George Washington, who did not support the women’s efforts, but he could not fully challenge the fundraising drive as that would be seen as unpatriotic. Yet, it was women within the domestic sphere of the roles they were accustomed to that helped the war effort. The Ladies of Philadelphia made clothing for the soldiers while other women became camp followers and looked after them. Other women took on the role of a man to fight in the Revolutionary War or became camp followers and followed the men to battle. Such positions were frowned upon by the male sphere, but as this chapter will discuss, despite these women facing obstacles, they could fulfil military roles just as well as male soldiers could too, and they did so to the best of their ability.
Esther de Berdt Reed was born in England but moved to the colonies after her marriage. Yet before she had set foot on American soil, she was opposed to the British rule in the colonies describing Members of Parliament George Grenville and Alexander Wedderburn as ‘such enemies to America’. Her support for America allowed her to be accepted as a patriot’s wife in the colonies.[77] By the autumn of 1780, many ladies in Philadelphia came together to raise money and then make clothing for soldiers.[78] Reed was promoted to the head of this association who, despite her being English, was seen as ‘the best patriot, the most zealous and active, and the most attacked the interests of her country’.[79] The Ladies of Philadelphia worked hard and surrendered their jewels and anything else they thought was worthwhile and, in doing so, raised $7,500 in a time when money was devalued.[80] The Ladies Association of Philadelphia’s fundraising plans were progressive and well organised, allowing women to enter the war effort on their terms.
Individual women had published their own opinions on what was happening in the colonies, but this did nothing to engage women into mass mobilisation. One such example was written by a female colonist called Clarissa, who wrote in the United States Magazine in 1779 describing her “Vision of the Paradise of Female Patriotism” and a “delicious garden” that belonged to women in the colonies. Clarissa suggested that women within the colonies walked with the heroines from histories, such as Deborah, Boadicea, and John of Arc. Clarissa preferred to discuss the women of the past.[81] Yet Clark Smith believes that the women in the colonies during the Revolutionary War were looking to past rebellions such as the boycotts of 1769 to mobilise themselves for political action. Such action would not usually be open to them within the realms of their domestic sphere but could be found within social and commercial areas such as the areas in which they lived and where they shopped.[82] This was because women were consumers, they bought food at the markets so they could easily boycott goods to make their point. This lack of mobilisation within the women’s sphere ended on June 10, 1780, when John Dunlap, an Irish printer who had printed the first copies of the Declaration of Independence, printed an anonymously authored broadside titled “The Sentiments of an American Woman” in Philadelphia. We now know that this writing can be attributed to Reed. Within the article, Reed argued that women of the colonies should ‘aspire to render themselves more really useful’.[83] The article aimed to justify women taking part in the war effort and recommended that women start collecting donations to commemorate the female heroines from the past. The “Sentiments of an American Woman” urged women to surrender any item that appeared too extravagant for the war effort.[84] The article suggests that women entering the political realm could also be active within the domestic sphere and carry out duties in both domains.[85] Reed wrote that women were ‘born for liberty, disdaining to bear the irons of a tyrannic Government’ and asserted that ‘if the weakness of our Constitution, if opinion and manners did not forbid us to march to glory by the same paths as the Men women would be found at least equal, and sometimes surpass them in our love for the public good’.[86] Reed understood that women could not be satisfied with not entering the Revolutionary cause. Still, she also appreciated that because of the social customs related to her gender, women could not merely ‘march to glory by the same paths as the Men’. Reed referred back to historical women who were “Born for Liberty”. Women such as the biblical Deborah and Joan of Arc who had disregarded “the weakness of their sex” and made great sacrifices to save their countries. In this sense, Reed believed women in the colonies could also rise in the same way.[87] With regards to Joan of Arc, Reed wrote that she had rid from France ‘the ancestors of these same British, whose odious yoke we have just shaken off, and whom it is necessary that we drive from the Continent’.[88] Ireland concludes that Reed saw men and women as equals and had the same responsibilities within the society. Women did not fade into the background during the Revolutionary War but changed their way of life to support the war effort. Women’s assertiveness came from the domestic and social domains, and they were able to enter the political realms individually.[89] From “Sentiments of an American Woman”, we can understand how women gained civic awareness because of the sensitive language. It was challenging for Reed to discuss women entering the war effort within the boundaries of feminine patriotism supported by republican thought.[90] What Reed had achieved was novel for the American woman; because of the war effort, women had no choice but to find their place in society to help the battle of independence.
Broadside of Sentiments of an American Woman. Date 1780.
Referring directly to the generosity of Reed and the ladies in Philadelphia ‘Sentiments of an American woman’ the soldiers had felt ‘neglected’ before the ‘mark of respect’ was shown by the women. However, George Washington was less enthusiastic about the women’s help in Philadelphia and preferred soldiers to receive clothing from the fundraising drive rather than money. Washington did not associate the women’s efforts as their attempt to enter the political realm describing the actions in a letter to Anne Francis as “the love of country…blessed with those softer domestic virtues.”[91] Not all women too were in favour of the fundraising efforts. One woman Anna Rawle, a Philadelphia loyalist, was against the idea describing the ladies as ‘extremely importunate that people were obliged to give them something to get rid of them…”[92] Because of Rawle’s politics as a Conservative we can understand her opinions may have been based upon political hostilities, but it does raise questions on how women in the Ladies Association acted. The fundraising efforts can be seen as women’s moral duty to the war effort, but it was the Philadelphia women’s devotion to the patriotic cause that enabled them to fundraise in such a way.[93] Washington’s criticisms did nothing to stop Reed and The Ladies of Philadelphia in their quest to fundraise for the soldiers, because he may have been opposed to their efforts but challenging these women would be seen as unpatriotic.
Reed also addressed the idea that some people may condemn the fundraising idea. Still, she declared in “Sentiments of an American Woman” that anyone protesting would not be a “good citizen” and that if soldiers needs were to be understood, then people would only “applaud our efforts for the relief of the armies which defend our lives, our possessions, our liberty.”[94] Despite some objection to the Ladies of Philadelphia, Reed was remembered for her patriotic efforts. Upon her death, the Pennsylvania Gazette published her tribute and praised her devotion to the revolutionary cause. The tribute stated that “Those disposed to lessen the reputation of female patriotism might have said that what our women have contributed, must, in the first instance, have come from the pockets of their husbands; but, where their labour is bestowed, the most delicate fingers being employed in the workmanship it must be acknowledged an effort of virtue, the praise of which must peculiarly belong to themselves.” So, despite entering the political realm by fundraising for the war effort, it was the domestic sphere of sewing that the Ladies of Philadelphia were praised for.[95] This suggests that woman could return to their domestic spheres once the Revolutionary War was over and that women were happy to do so. Yet, women’s rights in the new nation would come under scrutiny because of the actions of women during the Revolutionary War.
Women, too, played a significant but often unsung role when war was taking place. Women served as soldiers; some took on the role of their husbands when they were injured, while some simply followed their husbands to war as camp-followers.[96] All these women had a role to play in the Revolutionary War and completed their duties despite the male spheres attempts to exclude women from their efforts. Patriots were hesitant in allowing women to enter the Continental Army formally. Once the war was over, camp followers amounted to one woman per fifteen men, with women joining for various reasons, such as Martha Washington, looking for a sense of adventure and an escape from mundane life. Some women became camp followers because they had no means of supporting themselves while their husbands or fathers were at war. Women were able to stay with the army by becoming nurses for the injured troops, cooking for the military, and washing clothing and bedding for the soldiers.[97] Once again, the domestic work that women were so accustomed to became a valuable skill to have. Without the camp followers, the Continental Army would have struggled when conflict took place. But according to Berkin, the women in the camps were persevering with the situation they found themselves in. If anything, joining the Continental Army strengthened the idea that women were reliant on men within the hierarchy and those who were giving out orders were solely male.[98] To Washington, women placed demands on the armies already stretched food reserves. Women of the camps, according to Washington, were unruly and did not follow orders. They were a nuisance that the General could have done without.[99] Washington wanted his officers ‘to use every reasonable method…to get rid of all such as one not absolutely necessary’.[100] To Washington, women were only useful in stopping soldiers from deserting their posts. Washington begrudgingly realised that men needed their family members for a whole host of reasons, from companionship to nursing the soldiers when they were injured. According to Hutson, women who were seen as defiant in the camp had not been investigated because they were stationed in camp for the patriotic cause of freedom.[101] Blumenthal wrote in his book Women Camp Followers in the American Revolution that women who did follow the Continental Army were akin to Portia, the Goddess of Justice. He argued that ‘there is no trace of dissolute abandon among patriot camp followers, nor was there widespread drunkenness, for…the Americans were intoxicated only by the prospect of newfound freedom from rankling thrall’.[102] However, Blumenthal failed in his historiography in discovering such unruly women because, according to Berkin, there were ‘poorer camp followers, who seemed oblivious to every rule of feminine behaviour’. Such women drank to the point of drunkenness, used profanity, and became thieves for simple commodities such as food.[103] Female camp followers were simply behaving the same way as men, but their behaviour was frowned upon because they were women. However, women within the camp worked hard for minimal reward and did not liberate themselves or gain emancipation for their efforts.
Drawing of Margaret Corbin at the Battle of Monmouth. Date 1778.
Another type of woman emerged from the camps, which was one of taking on a man’s role to fight. When Margaret Corbin’s husband John was killed at Fort Washington, his wife took his role and suffered three gunshot wounds. Because of her injuries, she was awarded half the pay of a soldier’s ration and a clothing allowance.[104] Despite Corbin’s heroic efforts, the hierarchical structures in the colonies did not allow women to be treated the same as men, despite carrying out the same role as a soldier. However, Corbin contested the amount she was granted by the Continental Congress and was given a full allowance.[105] Yet, Corbin having to fight for a small allowance shows how difficult it was for women to have any rights within Revolutionary America. Corbin did not hide her gender, but there is conflicting evidence for how those women who did hide their gender were treated. For instance, if a woman was discovered quickly, she was harshly penalised. One such woman was Ann Bailey, who enlisted under the name Samuel Smith. Under this pseudonym, Bailey collected a bounty of eighty dollars, but she was quickly discovered and dismissed from the army, fined, and jailed for two weeks. Yet, the likes of Deborah Sampson, who enlisted in the Continental Army as Robert Shurtleff, served for many years as s soldier. When Sampson’s gender was finally discovered, she was removed from the Continental Army and given an allowance from Massachusetts for her role in the war.[106] The history of Deborah Sampson is incomplete. Historians do not know if Sampson had a patriotic sense of duty to enlist in the army or if she was running away from troubled family life. According to Kravitz, Sampson was patriotic because she risked her female identity to disguise herself as a man.[107] There was no continuity in how women were treated, and because of this, it is evident that women were not expected to fight on the front line. However, when they did fight, the army officers and Continental Congress did not have any policies in place to deal with the situation.
From the evidence provided in this chapter the women living in the American colonies had a need to assist the war effort. While male family members busied themselves with fighting on the battlefields women could actively help with fundraising ideas for the cause. Reeds ‘Sentiments of an American Woman’ showed that women could be active within the war effort despite women being restricted by their gender. It is clear that the Ladies of Philadelphia utilised their social networks at home to assisted the fighting men and crossed the boundaries of femininity to aid their cause. However, despite criticisms from the likes of Washington, Reed was able to continue with her fundraising drive because if Washington forced the ladies to stop it would be seen as unpatriotic. Camp followers too can be seen as patriotic. They played an important role in helping the soldiers take care of themselves and despite Washington’s criticisms he realised the women were a help to the soldiers when it came to boosting morale. Women who pretended to be soldiers brought a rise in different treatments for women who either did not hide their gender or concealed their sex to enter battle. Fighting on the front line was seen as not appropriate female behaviour and it was difficult for the military officers to know how to react. Women broke the boundaries of what was expected of them to support the American Revolutionary War effort despite being limited by their gender and the hierarchical structures that were in place in the late eighteenth century.
CONCLUSION
Using primary sources such as letter and broadsides from women associated with the American Revolutionary War to document how women were treated in society at the time, this dissertation has investigated how revolutionary the American Revolutionary War was for women in the American colonies. Connecting the three different areas of study, this conclusion offers final comments on the findings of the three chapters and their significance in the historiography.
While each chapter examines a different portrayal of the experiences felt by women in the American colonies, there are apparent connections between the women’s participation in the American Revolutionary War and society’s reaction towards female involvement. However, the women’s experiences indicated in this dissertation suggest that women’s encounter in the colonies brought about a commitment to assist the war effort regardless of negative attitudes towards their approach.
Chapter one investigated the lives of writers Phillis Wheatley and Mary Otis Warren and how their opinions were built around the thoughts of male friends and family members. It is clear that Wheatley’s owners were influential in her thinking, and this was a reason for her being cautious in how she approached discussions on slavery. As a female, her voice would have been lost with numerous debates on the slave issue. The fact that Wheatley was black and also lived her life in slavery meant that her opinion was not valued by those who relied on slavery within the private and public domains. Warren too was influenced by those men she trusted with her opinion. With her anonymous writing, she created a narrative that was not restricted by her gender. Because Warren needed validation from the likes of Adams for her writing, she does come across as weak-minded and constricted by her gender. However, Warren was aware of her limitations as a female writer and did not feel she could liberate herself from the hierarchical structures that were already in place.
Chapter two analysed women’s lack of political theory and how their gender roles were limited. The rise of discussion on women gaining some rights is evident in the primary source letters from Abigail Adams to her husband, John. She did not ask for emancipation but wanted women to gain some legal standing. However, some women were seen as inferior to man and therefore unable to enter the political realm. To understand the rights of man, the colonists looked to John Locke, who theorised that men were identical in a state of nature and collectively formed a social contract. This, however, did not liberate women because natural rights did not ask for women’s opinions, so women remained very much controlled by the patriarchy. What was acceptable in the colonies during the American Revolutionary War was the idea of Republican Motherhood. Women saw this role as necessary, but it was limiting and narrowed the political roles that women could play at the time. Although the Scottish philosophers valued the principles of the Republican Mothers who believed that there was virtue in women teaching their sons as they passed on family values. Although, despite the praise from the Scottish philosopher’s women were still limited and found it difficult to enter the political realm on their terms.
The third chapter focused on the attitudes towards The Ladies Association of Philadelphia during their fundraising drive during the American Revolutionary War and women who became camp followers to help look after the men on the frontline. Women who disguised their gender to fight for the cause was also discussed. Reeds fundraising drive showed just how active women could be when men were occupied at war. Camp followers, too, were useful to men in the war effort by taking care of the soldiers. However, despite women making themselves useful in the war effort, they did face criticisms. It was unclear how the male sphere should react to women’s mobilisation. This is evident when women took up the challenge of pretending to be men to fight on the frontline. Women who were caught crossing enemy lines were punished differently because military men did not collectively know how to treat such women. The rise in women mobilising themselves to assist in the war effort did very little to liberate women after the American Revolutionary War, with women returning to their lives of domesticity and childcare duties. Discussed collectively, the accounts from the colonial woman show that the American Revolutionary War was not revolutionary enough for females living in the new nation despite their best efforts to request a change. Any changes that came about for society at the time did not include women.
This dissertation concludes by acknowledging that women’s experience in the American Revolutionary War continued to have consequences after the war. Despite only investigating a small number of women’s narratives within the American Revolutionary War, it is evident from this study that depending upon broad conclusions to explain female encounter in the colonies during the American Revolutionary War betrays the variety of many of the individual accounts from numerous women. However, this does not ignore the women’s micro-historical narratives in this study because the females discussed here show how the patriarchy constrained women within the American colonies.
While this dissertation has uncovered women’s encounter in the American Revolutionary War, it is a micro-historical investigation. Therefore, there is an opportunity to widen the study. The range of individual narratives within this study indicates that it is important to analyse personal situations. However, colonial women’s experience of the American Revolutionary War constitutes a shared experience of female encounter within the colonies was not identical. Therefore, the accounts of the women involved must be recognised individually to accurately understand their significance and importance to the debates surrounding female encounter in the American Revolutionary War.
[1] Linda K. Kerber, Women of the Republic Intellect and Ideology in Revolutionary America (North Carolina, 1986), p. 11.
[2] Rosemarie Zagarri, Revolutionary Backlash: Women and Politics in the Early American Republic (Pennsylvania, 2007), p. 63.
[3] Gordon S. Wood, The Radicalism of the American Revolution (New York, 1991), p. 56.
[4] Carol Berkin, Revolutionary Mothers (New York, 2005), p. xvii.
[5] Linda K Kerber, ‘Separate Spheres, Female Worlds, Woman’s Place: The Rhetoric of Women’s History’, Oxford University Press, 75 (1988), pp. 9-12.
[6] Paul Thomas, ‘Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Sexist?’, Feminist Studies Inc, 17 (1991), pp. 196-215.
[7] Phillis Wheatley, Complete Writing (New York, 2001), p. xviii-xiv.
[8] Gay Gibson Cima, ‘Black and Unmarked: Phillis Wheatley, Mercy Otis Warren, and the Limits of the Strategic Anonymity’, Theatre Journal, 52 (2000), pp. 465-495.
[9] Phillis Wheatley, Susanna Wheatley and Sara Dunlop Jackson, ‘Letters of Phillis Wheatley and Susanna Wheatley’, The Journal of Negro History, 2 (1972), pp. 211-215.
[10] Mary Beth Norton, Liberty’s Daughters, (New York, 1980), p. 258.
[11] Wheatley, Wheatley and Dunlop, ‘Letters of Phillis Wheatley and Susanna Wheatley’, pp. 211.
[12] Eleanor Smith, ‘Phillis Wheatley A Black Perspective’, Journal of Negro Education, 43 (1974), pp. 405-406.
[19] Angelene Jamison, ‘Analysis of Selected Poetry of Phillis Wheatley’, The Journal of Negro Education, 43 (1974), p. 413-414.
[20] William H. Robinson, ‘Phillis Wheatley Colonial Quandary’, College Language Association, 9 (1965), pp. 31-32.
[21] Jamison, ‘Analysis of Selected Poetry of Phillis Wheatley’, p. 411.
[22] Tracey L. Waters, Review of Phillis Wheatley: Biography of a Genius in Bondage by Vincent Carretta, 3 (2012), p. 517.
[23] Rosemarie Zagarri, A Womans Dilemma: Mercy Otis Warren and the American Revolution (Chichester, 2015), p. 64.
[24] Gibson Cima, Gay ‘Black and Unmarked: Phillis Wheatley, Mercy Otis Warren, and the Limits of the Strategic Anonymity’, pp. 465-495.
[25] Sandra J. Sarkela, ‘Freedmon’s Call: The Persuasive Power of Mercy Otis Warren’s Dramatic Sketches, 1772-1775’, Ameican Literature, 3 (2009), pp. 544-545.
[26] Maud, Macdonald Hutcheson, ‘Mercy Warren, 1728-1814’, The William and Mary Quarterly, pp. 378-402.
[27] Mercy Otis Warren, The Group (United States, 1775).
[28] Sandra J. Sarkela, ‘Freedmon’s Call: The Persuasive Power of Mercy Otis Warren’s Dramatic Sketches, 1772-1775’, pp. 544-545.
[29] Cheryl Z. Oreovicz, ‘Mercy Otis Warren (1728-1814), Legacy 1 (1996), pp. 54-64.
[32] Edith B. Gelles, ‘Bonds of Friendship: The Correspondence of Abigail Adams and Mercy Otis Warren’, Massachusetts Historical Society, 108 (1996), p. 36.
[33] Linda K. Kerber, Women of the Republic, p. 256-57.
[34] Mercy Otis Warren, Poems, Dramatic and Miscellaneous (Boston, 1790), p. iii-iv.
[35] Rosemarie Zagarri, Mercy Otis Warren and the American Revolution (Oxford, 2015), pp. 65-74.
[43] Rosemarie Zagarri, ‘The Rights of Man and Woman in Post-Revolutionary America’, Omohundro Institute of Early American History and Culture, 55 (1998), p. 202-213.
[44] Marilyn S. Blackwell, ‘The Republican Vision of Mary Palmer’, University of Pennsylvania Press, 12 (1992), pp. 20-22.
[45] Rosemarie Zagarri, ‘Morals, Manners and the Republican Mother’, The John Hopkins University Press, 44, p 193.
[65] Blackwell, ‘The Republican Vision of Mary Palmer’, pp. 20-22.
[66] Margaret A. Nash, ‘Rethinking Republican Motherhood: Benjamin Rush and the Young Ladies Academy of Philadelphia’, University of Pennsylvania, 17 (1997), pp. 175-188.
[67] Zagarri, ‘Morals, Manners and the Republican Mother’, p. 192-203.
[79] Ellet, The Women of the American Revolution: Volume 1, p. 53.
[80] Elizabeth Ellet The War in the Middle States, in Lincoln Diamant (ed), Revolutionary Women in the War for American Independence (Westport, 1998), pp. 95-99.
[81] Clarissa a Lady of This City, Vision of the Paradise of Female Patriotism, United States Magazine, March 1779.
[82] Barbara Clark Smith, The Freedoms we Lost (New York, 2010), p.135.
[89] Edith Gelles, Review of Sentiments of a British American Woman: Esther de Berdt Reed and the American Revolution, by Owen S. Ireland, 76 (2019), pp. 313-317.
[90] Emily J. Arendt, Ladies Going about for Money: Female Voluntary Association and Civic Consciousness in the American Revolution, Journal of the Early Republic, 34 (2014), pp. 157-186.
[107] Bennett Kravitz, ‘A Certain Doubt: The Last Voice of Deborah Sampson in Revolutionary America’, Popular Culture Association in the South, 22 (1999), p. 48.
It has been many years since I have visited The National Trust nature reserve at Formby, nineteen years to be precise before I knew that I was pregnant with my eldest daughter and I breathlessly climbed an Everest sized sand hill for the fun of it. In recent years I have tried to visit the area, but every time the car park sign read full, so this time, I did what I don’t usually do and relied upon public transport – Mersey rail to be exact. I cannot remember the last time I boarded a train for anywhere other than London, it was way before my driving days, and I have been driving since I was eighteen years old. Lou doesn’t do public transport as a rule! But I am so old that I remember that the driving theory test was carried out using pencil and paper, whereas now it is all computerised and you need to be a Philadelphia lawyer to carry out the hazard perception test alone. (I know this because I tried and failed to become a driving instructor). So, since passing my driving test using public transport has become alien to me and in my twenties and thirties, life was lived in a haze of children, appointments and the need to travel from a to b as quickly as possible. Now I’m 40…1 (eek) I am slowing down the pace, realising that there is no need to be in such a hurry and sometimes it is just lovely to hand the controls over to someone else ( in this case the train driver) and enjoy the journey. I travelled from St Michaels station in Aigburth with two of my daughters for a fee of eleven pounds which would have taken us to Southport if we so wished, so overall; I felt it was good value for a family ticket and quite a reasonable day out. One lesson I learnt on the train is to not point out any landmarks on the train to my youngest daughter Hannah! Upon seeing Anfield from near Sandhills station, she asked me where Everton’s new stadium was and then proceeded to tell the whole carriage that they stank so bad and were rubbish at football! Thanks for that Hannah, at least I’ve taught her well when it comes to football! The trip was good, except for the usual ‘are we there yet’ from my Everton hating daughter, and once we left the train, we had a fifteen-minute walk up Victoria Road to the nature reserve.
The view from the train
Upon reaching our destination, the car park was already full (how many does it hold, two?) So, we did make the best decision by not bringing the car. By this point, we were all starving, and sensible me had packed lunch, so we entered the squirrel walk area where we found it was much cooler with the trees acting as umbrellas overhead.
Squirrel Walk
After a short walk, we came across a poster, I do this annoying thing where I have to read out everything I come across to the kids, and this was no exception. ‘POX RIDDLED SQUIRRELS’ the poster read. ‘In this area, if you see any dead red squirrels call this number, get out, stay out and douse yourself in Dettol!’ Ok, the last part was only what the kids heard, but they were already stomping their way out of the squirrel walk and heading for the beach. So, the possibility of seeing dead squirrels was firmly off the table but let’s take out chances with the jellyfish eh? Thankfully and much to my relief, no jellyfish were present, I had had a fear of them since I came across a group of children on New Brighton beach when I was eleven years old after discovering feral children stabbing jellyfish with sticks which ultimately put me off wobbly jelly for life! So obviously the beach is a hazard for me, and you know there is the worry of sinking sand and no doubt that if that were to happen, then it would certainly happen to me.
Hannah enjoying the beach
We took out shoes off despite not having anything to dry our feet, although Hannah had the idea, we could use her coat (such a resourceful child she is) and enjoyed a nice splash in the warm water. The tide was way out, but we walked to it. Hannah wanted to go in up to her chest, but she would have been swept out to New Brighton, so that was a no! We played in the sand, and I made sure we left a reminder on the beach as an unbearable Liverpool supporter. I do hope a Manchester City fan saw it.
My beach artwork
We then walked back and left the beach, but this time we walked towards a different exit; well, it can’t be all that difficult to find the main road back to the station, can it? WRONG! After climbing high sandhills, which I’m impressed to say didn’t leave me puffed out (I’m fitter than I thought) we came across a wooded area without a path, no real problem kids we’ll push away the branches and walk through the brambles. I showed the girls my moves and what to do, feeling like my old PE teacher. (Basically, just showing off.) But feeling confident and like a female Bear Grylls until I stumbled and fell on my backside! Cue lots of laughter from the kids who soon lost interest in my accident as they spotted a rabbit and not just any old rabbit either, this boy must have weighed 80lb! He was huge!
Me, after my little accident
So, after stopping to reattach shoes to sandy coated feet we began marching through the dense wooded area, mostly without an internet connection and the fear of never finding our way out and having to sleep in the woods all night to be ravaged by evil bunnies, I guess. Sometimes I wish that I didn’t have a good imagination; it can be a blessing and a curse.
Lost in the forest
Finally, after an hour of walking through the trees, we came to an opening and a map. A lady was walking her dog, so I asked her the way to the station. She pointed me in the direction of the nightmare forest and gave instructions, thanks but no thanks! I’m not the best at map reading, so we headed off at a guess, at least now we were on a civilised path. Eventually, we came to another map that pointed us the way to the train station. Feeling like we had walked through the desert, we finally found Freshfield station and made our way back, thoroughly shattered but happy with our day in the sunshine and with nature. It is incredible what a little bit of sun and fresh air can do for your mood. So overall a great day but I think that I will save the Bear Grylls adventures for the man himself.
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